


Sonic Forces

by Ways



Category: Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types
Genre: Action/Adventure, Friendship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2018-09-13
Packaged: 2019-02-17 11:48:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13076241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ways/pseuds/Ways
Summary: Sonic has been defeated and with that the world has no choice but to submit to the might of the Eggman Empire. With his powerful new weapon, there is little the resistance can do to stop him.As if that weren't bad enough, the day they lost Sonic was the day they lost Tails as well.For months battles were won and battles were lost, but a new hero has appeared and the old returns. They'll need each other to reignite the light of hope in the world.And as for Tails? Perhaps the sands of time can bring him the hope he needs.War, glory, friendship and fist bumps ensue as our heroes rise up and take back their world.Sonic Forces Rewrite





	1. Prologue: A Fallen World

**Author's Note:**

> Y’know that feeling when you really don’t have the time to write a fic but your hand slips and out pops the first chapter? That’s sorta what happened to me with this.
> 
> I don’t have much time, but I’m really interested in this story considering how many ideas I have for it, so I’m gonna try and see it through to the end.
> 
> Welcome to Sonic Forces, this is a story basically taking the story of the original game, but expanding it to my heart’s greatest desires. Buckle up everyone, because we’re going to be in for a wild ride.
> 
> All you should know is that while some things are going to be kept the same in this story, others will be changed depending on what works for this story I have planned out. So… yeah. Without further ado, let’s begin with this chapter that is more or less taken directly from the game. Hehe, sorry guys, gotta start somewhere.
> 
>  
> 
> Disclaimer: I don’t own Sonic the Hedgehog, because if I did? Well… Forces would’ve been what this story is and not what it turned out to be.

 

 

**Sonic Forces**

**Prologue:** **  
** **A Fallen World**

 

Doctor Eggman: the world’s greatest scientific genius with an IQ of 300 and resident evil mastermind had tried time and time again since to take over the world and defeat its savior, Sonic the Hedgehog. They had been fighting each other for years now, but as the hedgehog got older and older and the world began to change more and more, the doctor began to get bigger and bigger failures.  
_What was it?_ He wondered. He had hundreds upon thousands of robots at his disposal, he had foolproof plans capable of besting master tacticians, he had everything in his power to take the world by storm. But always fell short thanks to one hedgehog. It always made him scratch his head.

But that was in the past. 

This time things would be different. 

After his defeat on the Lost Hex, he had gone into hiding. He remembered that he’d said that he’d find a new conch and use that to conquer the Zeti again. But he quickly grew tired of the idea, especially after what he had found.

This new discovery, it held immense power and after countless hours of experimentation, tests gone wrong and accidentally alerting an emerald guardian, he was proud of what he had accomplished today. 

And if it was with that pride that he strolled down the halls of the secret base in Green Hill Zone. Darkness surrounded the mad doctor before he reached his destination and the electronic door slid open, bathing him in the baby blue light of the laboratory.

The laboratory was made up of rows upon rows of stasis tubes containing a mishmash of red cubes in varying degrees of decay that floated aimlessly about in the clear liquid; in the middle of the room was the main console and its screen which displayed his newest creation. 

“Sonic… how I hate him.” Eggman started.

The only two that were there to hear him were his two robot assistants Cubot and Orbot. The former was scrubbing away at one of the many tubes while the latter typed away at the console, both of them listened to intently to their master.

“And all of that loathing has been focused into this invincible instrument of destruction!”

He pointed at the chamber that Cubot dutifully wiped away at as he hummed a happy tune. He now began to walk towards it.

“Every defeat, every humiliation at that hedgehog’s hands will be returned a thousand fold by invincible creation!”

He pushed Cubot away to which the robot let out a cry, as Eggman looked on at it with a prideful grin.

“This is my dream come true… With this invention, I can expand the Eggman Empire across the globe and conquer the world!” 

With that he began to out an evil laugh. 

“The boss means business this time.” Orbot added from where he stood to which Cubot nodded in agreement. 

The doctor began to laugh and laugh as soon his newest plan would be allowed to come to fruition. 

But as the cackles continued, his creation looked at his master and clenched its fists.

 

**~Sonic Forces~**

 

Sonic couldn’t help but grin as he made a mad dash through what couldn’t be better described as home. Or well… as close to one as he really had anyway. Being always on the move meant that he didn’t stay in one place for too long. But still, amongst maybe a handful of other places, this was probably the place he came back to most often. 

There was something that he always loved about his feet pounding on the checkerboard rock… Something about the lush green grass tickling his feet as he breezed on through… Something about exploring the expansive caves underground. There was just something about Green Hill Zone that made him feel so alive. 

He chalked it up to nostalgia. But even he knew there was a little more to it than that.

Right now he just needed a break, and that’s how he found himself running through his home again. 

Eggman had been active these days, but also quiet about it. Places around the world began changing in ways that the hedgehog didn’t quite understand. But he knew that it had something to do with Eggman. 

And then Knuckles randomly came off of his island and wanted everyone to join him in the fight against Eggman. Sonic would’ve poked fun at him for being so serious about Eggman being up to his usual tricks. But the fact that Silver of all people had been there with him definitely meant something was up.

So, Sonic and the others joined what Knuckles was calling the resistance and their  _ fearless leader  _ was starting to drive him a little crazy which is why he had broken out of their little base for a bit for a breather.

And that’s how he found himself dashing across some of the hills that were still green.

He wasn’t even sure how, but Eggman managed to get rid of all the water in the zone. All of it. Sure, some of the plants was able to stay green despite everything. But the rest? A deserted wasteland complete with sand and white, dying grass that saddened the blue blur to no end. Pyramids rose high up into the sky even above the tallest checkered hills and it was just weird. Whatever Eggman had done, it clearly left the place in ruin.

Still, Sonic ran and kicked up grass in his wake. Alone to his thoughts as he zoomed past tikis, over hills and tip-tapping along checkered stretches of land. Even if he was left alone to his thoughts of Eggman and whatever his latest scheme was, he at least managed to get away from Knuckles and his constant badgering.

Of course, his little reprieve wouldn’t last long. When he made his way over a large hill and under an archway of rock, his communicator sprang to life.

“Sonic! Eggman’s forces are surging into the city. We need you here now!” Tails called. 

He was a little surprised to hear his little brother’s voice. He had expected Knuckles to reprimand him for hopping off the grid again. 

Still, without missing a beat, he answered. “Don’t worry, Tails. I’ll be there soon!” 

And so he was off like a shot, zooming across a long stretch of land high above the sands.

He hated to leave Green Hill so soon, but if people were in trouble, there was no question.

He continued along, using a spring to propel himself onto another stretch of land before boosting ahead. He knew that if he wanted to get to the city there was no time to waste.

He ran into some of Eggman’s robots stationed throughout the zone, but that wasn’t much of a problem for him, ramming through them and continuing along the path.

It was only when he was propelled into the air with another group of springs that he saw the Sandworm drilling into and out of the sand in the distance.

It stretched over hundreds upon hundreds of feet, sending mountains of sand into the sky. Just the sheer size of it was baffling to Sonic, but he didn’t let it get to him as he continued along through the green hills until he went down a tube that lead him to the vast desert below.

He kicked up sand, hopped over fallen totems and rammed into whatever Eggman robots came in his way. 

After a quick trot over the bridge, he knew he was almost there. Just a little bit more and he’d be in the city. 

_ Almost there, buddy. Just hold on. _

 

**~Sonic Forces~**

 

Tails had had seen better days. Literally any other day before had been better, but this? This was absolutely positively insane. 

Eggman had decided to launch a full scale attack on Sunset Heights and of course, the resistance was in a frenzy doing their best to try and contain the situation. Not only was this a location that the resistance was barely able to keep from Eggman, but it was home to their base of operations. They couldn’t let the city fall.

Knuckles was quick, dispatching any and all troops around the city to save the people and protect the base.

Tails was on rescue duty and had made quick work of any robots that would come his way while pointing people in the right direction.

But he was running amongst the fire, the destruction and everything. He had to be careful not only for the people running and screaming around him or even the laserfire of Eggman’s robot army, but also the debris that fell atop their heads due to the constant cannonfire from the ships above ramming into buildings around them.

It was absolute madness.

Which is why he had to run, saving as many as he could.

It wasn’t long before he found a clearing in the city. It wasn’t much, just a little square that people could use to get into different buildings.

But what did concern him was the fact that he spotted a group of civilians cowering in fear at the sight of the robots.

Tails ran in, swinging his namesakes around and taking out several of the machines.

People cheered as he fought them. Tails, had saved him. They were going to be okay!

When the robots were cleared out, Tails couldn’t help but smile before he looked at the others.

“Is everyone okay?” He asked them.

Several of them gave their affirmations only to stiffen at the sound of a light humming from behind the fox.

“No, Tails. You just so happen to be ruining the fun.”

Tails spun around, to come face to face with Doctor Eggman sitting with his usual cheshire grin.

“Eggman!” Tails cried out.

“The one and only. Glad to see you little minscreants are enjoying themselves while I burn down this city.”

“The only one having fun here is you!”

“Perhaps. But that makes it all the more enjoyable.”

Eggman then leaned back against the Eggpod, bored. Looking at Tails, he lazily added. “Y’know, this could all end if you just surrender. No one’s hands have to get dirty and I’ll even send you all some nice rooms in the Eggman Empire Maximum Security Prison! Free of charge! Nothing but the best for the resistance!”

“We’re never surrendering to you, Eggman!”

“Really now? Suit yourselves. But Tails, you expect to go up against all of these robots by yourself?”

Tails looked at him confusedly. “What robots?”

There was a weird sound at that moment and before them, several Eggpongs appeared between Tails and Eggman.

“Wha?!”

“Oh yes, there they are.”

Tails looked back to the civilians who were looking terrified at the robots. He waved them back as he looked a little nervously at them.

“I’m not afraid of them!”

“Suit yourself, friend.”

And with that, they marched forward, ready to take out the fox.

He took on a stance, ready to take on the army as Eggman gleefully watched the scene play out in front of him.

But in like the wind, a blue blur homed into a robot at the head of the group before bouncing in between a few more. It rose up into the air revealing the world’s fastest hero: Sonic the Hedgehog.

The civilians couldn’t help but smile and cheer at the sight, one of them, a human child even pointed in the sky and called out his name.  **[1]**

But just as quick as he appeared, he seemingly disappeared again. The robots tried to fire on him, but he was just too fast. Seemingly blinking into and out of existence before there was nothing left but a pile of scrap on the floor.

“Is everyone okay?”

They could only cheer; not only Sonic saving them, but seeing him in action first hand.

Tails was the one who answered. “We are thanks to you. Cutting it a little close though, pal.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty much how I roll.”

He then turned and pointed to Eggman, who was still wearing his cheshire grin. “Okay. let’s finish this, Eggman!”

But he still smiled at him. “But it will be your finish, Sonic. Behold the power of my ultimate masterpiece!” 

He was already running at him before he even got the chance to finish his sentence. He jumped up into the air and homed in on the doctor.

At least, he would’ve.

But from above came an orange streak of light that slammed into him, knocking him out of his attack and towards the ground. 

Tails couldn’t help but gulp at the sight, quickly ushering the civilians out of the way and too safety.

Sonic was able to land in a crouch and look up at what had interrupted him. Needless to say, he was shocked at what he saw.

Crouched before him was another hedgehog, this one black in color, with red streaks in the quills around his head. Sonic knew him all too well. He was the darkest of days, the ultimate life form, but most importantly he was a foe turned friend. It was… 

“Shadow?!” He gasped. 

The hedgehog simply crossed his arms and huffed, looking away from Sonic. 

He couldn’t believe it. Was he truly Eggman’s ultimate creation? But it couldn’t possibly be him. What the heck?!

Unfortunately he didn’t have much time to think as things continued to get worse.

From atop one of the buildings, a new figure leapt out, landing next to Shadow. This one was a hulking red creature with black legs, clawed hands and feet, a long red tail and long striped horns atop its head. With his wild blue ponytail, spikes protruding from his shoulders and the spiked arm bands he wore, it was no doubt in his mind that it was the tallest of mountains, a mighty Zeti and the leader of the Deadly Six. He was... 

“Zavok?!”

“We meet again, hedgehog.” The creature snarled as he got up and opened his piercing yellow eyes.

The all familiar sound of rushing wind then followed. They looked up into the sky to see a robot made entirely in Sonic’s image swoop down and land in front of them. He was the toughest of terrors, created to stop Sonic at every turn and wreak havoc on the world. He was…

“Metal?!” 

He beeped an affirmation.

Finally one of the hydrants in the area burst open to which a stream of water flew into the sky and landed in front of them. It collected before solidifying into a humanoid creature with glowing green eyes and a brain that could be seen through its translucent body. The roughest of waves, a long forgotten enemy and the God of Destruction. It was…

“Chaos?!” 

Chaos just stared.

The four of them stood together, glaring at Sonic with Eggman in his pod, continuing to grin at the sight of it all.Sonic couldn’t help but think that if looks could kill, he’d be a goner. Taking them all on together would be tough. But he’s faced them before. He could take them.

At that moment, a new figure decided to hover down in front of him. It was a dark figure bathed in a dark red aura. It looked to be some sort of canine with its short black fur and long bushy striped tail. But along with that, it had on the usual gloves and shoes, although his were a lot grimmer than most and a scarf. But the most striking things about him had to be his mask, a dull, dirtied silver thing that pointed outwards. The one eye he could see was piercing yellow and showed out amongst the red glass of one side of the helmet, the other however was completely covered. That and the ruby red embed in his chest.

He’d never seen him before.

Of course, he couldn’t think much of his appearance. He knew that if he was gonna stand a chance here, then the first thing to do would be to take out the unknown threat as soon as possible.

As soon as the figure touched down, he flicked his nose and was off like a shot, boosting towards it at point blank range.

Except he didn’t hit his mark.

“Huh?” Sonic said, looking confusedly at the group who were now looking at him. The figure was standing a foot to the right of where he once was. 

As the figure rose into the air, Tails gasped. “This guy’s faster than Sonic!” 

“No he’s not! My aim was off!” Sonic retorted he dodged laserfire from the being before homing in on it. 

But it knocked him out of the attack, punting him into the air like a soccer ball before flying up and sending a roundhouse into his stomach. He slammed into the wall behind him, causing it to crumble and the rubble to fall around him. He let out a groan at this, knowing that as soon as the adrenaline wore off he was gonna be sore.

Tails cringed at the sight, before snapping his attention back to the figure above. “No, wait! It’s something else. Gotta scan him to figure this out.”

Sonic was rising up to his feet only for the figure to shoot more lasers at him.

He quickly dodged only for more trouble to come his way in the form of a roaring Zeti.

Sonic was quick to dodge his punch before sending a roundhouse into his stomach, causing him to stumble.  **[2]**

He then boosted away, completely knocking him off balance. He jumped in the air going for the being, but it dodged again.

This time, Metal was the one to attempt to meet him on his path. But he caught wind of this, stomping to the ground so that the he wouldn’t get him.

Once again, he tried to hit the being, but it dodged.

He landed atop a building only for Chaos to appear and grapple with him. 

“What are you? How are you doing this?” Sonic asked.

He got his answer in the form of a kick to the stomach which knocked him across the pavement.

“Nice.” Eggman smiled.

Sonic groaned. Slowly rising to his feet again. “Tails, I need to know what’s going on with this guy!”

Tails now had out his Miles Electric and pressed buttons atop the console. “I’m trying Sonic, but these readings are all messed up! They don’t make any sense!”

Sonic slipped under another roundhouse from the being before bouncing away.

The thing was upon him before he even had the chance to land, kicking him into the wall.

Once again, it crumbled underneath him. To him it felt like an eternity for his body to slowly peel off of it when it was only a few moments.

When he finally did, the being was already upon him, sending him up into the sky. 

He cried out as he was struck by attacks from all of them.

When he was finally thrown to the floor, he tried to get up on shaky legs, ragged breath and swimming vision.

But it was too much for him. His body gave out and the world around him went dark.

The last things he registered were the sounds of his little brother screaming his name and the sight of the figure’s feet.

**~Sonic Forces~**

That day, Sunset Heights had fallen. Eggman’s armies were able to seize control of the city with the help of the generals of his empire: Shadow, Metal Sonic, Chaos and Zavok. Not only had the city been lost but the resistance had taken a heavy hit with their base being destroyed and losing so many of their forces that day, including the world’s greatest hero: Sonic the Hedgehog. 

With that, the world was plunged into chaos. With this new power of his, Eggman had been able to conquer large portions of the world, despite the resistance’s best efforts. Battles had been won and battles had been lost.

But in the end? It didn’t matter as the Eggman Empire crossed the globe and without Sonic? The world fell. 


	2. Chapter 1: Justice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From humble beginnings, a new hero will rise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we’re back again for another round of this fic. What do we have in store for this one? Well, that’s simple, we’re about to meet the custom character. So… most of you wanted a real OC so I guess I’ll do that. Without further ado, let’s begin shall we.

Destruction.

That was all the city knew at this point.

Robots patrolled the streets, enforcing the law of the Eggman Empire.

Cannonfire constantly rained upon the city in a never ending hellfire.

The city was in so much disarray, that it was a shell of its former self.

But if that wasn’t bad enough?

Then the entire army of Death Egg Robots destroying everything in their path?

Ever since Sonic the Hedgehog had been defeated and the Eggman Empire had risen, the world had not been a safe place; especially in Sunset Heights.

At least, that’s what thirteen year old Celeste the Dog thought.

The young dog had stuck to an abandoned building in the middle of town as she watched her hometown fall to the might of the empire. Only time she left was to get food and water, but otherwise, the young dog kept to her own personal bunker.

But now, she cowered under the table as the sirens blared all over the city. That meant that the Resistance was here.

She always appreciated the work the resistance did. They saved a lot of people around the world and even her own a few times. Heck, that’s how she got a wispon in the first place. But despite it all, she found it all pointless. Eggman had taken over so much and with that  _ thing _ on his side, there was no way they could possibly defeat him. Especially when Sonic had lost to it.

She preferred to hide.

Even with the protection of her battered Wispon, she didn’t dare try anything. She had even been too scared to test the thing out; especially with the dents all over its near spherical frame. And honestly, on what? What could she have used it on? Go outside and trash some of Eggman’s robots and get a one-way ticket to who knows whatever prison Eggman had or worse? No.

She would stay here, huddled under a table, desperately clutching their Wispon as everything went on outside. 

She jumped at the sound of projectiles slamming against the side of the building. Rubble fell but the building stayed strong. She trembled, whimpering underneath the table. Whenever the cannons were so close, it always terrified her. She needed to calm down, slow her breathing and just stop whimpering like a baby. 

She stopped, she breathed, she was finally able to stay calm. She was safe. Nothing would happen to her.

With a ragged breath, they got she got up from under the table. It was going to be okay. Everything was fine.

And that’s when the door burst open. 

A single Egg Pong stood in front of him with its cream spherical body and arm blaster trained on her.

It stood there for a few seconds before it looked down at the weapon underneath the bed. 

The enemy was here.

“Wispon: Located. Subject: Unknown. Conclusion: Member of the resistance.”

Her eyes widened at that. “What?! No!”

“Turn yourself in or be eliminated!”

“No, please! I’m not part of the resistance! I’m just trying to protect myself!”

“Elimination selected.”

The robot raised his arm blaster towards him and fired, letting out a flurry of lasers towards them.

The dog yelped at that and dove out of the way of the first few shots. But the robot followed, and they scampered away. But not without getting her tail singed.

She begged for the robot to stop, but it wouldn’t.

She ran around the room, scared as blasts ripped holes in the walls.

And then, among all the running and screaming and laser blasts, she spotted the Wispon. There it was sitting under the table where she’d left it. But what was she supposed to do with it? Strike it down?

But the thing was shooting up her home and it didn’t look like it was going to stop.

A laser grazed her ear, lightly singing blue fur. And that’s when she knew she didn’t have a choice.

She ran for the weapon, still barely dodging the shots before going into a roll and scooping up the weapon. She landed in a crouch and pulled the trigger.

She didn’t expect the burst of flame to come so quickly or to punch so hard that it shattered the robot on impact and tore a hole through the wall. But it did.

Celeste let out a sigh of relief and fell to her knees.

But that wasn’t the end of her troubles. 

The hole in the wall caught the attention of more of the army. Buzz Bombers flew in and the robots below quickly ran into the building entrance. They wouldn’t be long.

But right now, she had the immediate problem of the Buzzer Bombers that were in front of her now, preparing to fire.

**_Here come the enemy! Strike them down!_ **

She didn’t hesitate this time, the need for survival overriding her own fear as she fired a burst of flame at them. They exploded before her and with that, she quickly ran out of the room and up the stairs to avoid the robots below. 

She arrived on the roof where she was bathed in the ever present twilight of Sunset Heights. Normally this would be calming for Celeste. But now, she was exposed to the warzone that was the city. Of course, she didn’t have much time to look around.

The robots made it to the roof and the scared little dog didn’t have much of a choice. She could either face the whole pack of robots or she could run.

She didn’t like his odds with the robots so she looked for any escapes. Unfortunately, the only way down was the way she came.

Although, scanning around she did see the next roof over was a bit lower than this one. If she ran fast enough... 

But that was crazy! There was no way she could do something like that.

Turning back, she saw the robots charging their blasts again and didn’t want to stick around for that. Roof it was.

And that’s how flawed logic and the need to survive sent her tumbling off of a roof.

Luckily, she made a safe landing. But she still couldn’t help but think how stupid she was to have tried something like that.

The robots above looked back at her, they looked between one another before following her off the roof.

Of course, unlike her, they didn’t have the speed to make the jump and fell to the ground where they came broke into millions of pieces.

Celeste found it kinda funny. She wanted to laugh but was quickly cut off by the Buzz Bombers flying in.

They shot blasts at her and she was off again, now hopping rooftop to rooftop as she tried to avoid the laserfire from the flying robots.

But they just kept coming and coming and soon, she’d run out of roof.

So that’s when she spun around, gripping the wispon and allowing the flames to come forth and dismantle the robots.

**_We can’t let evil win take ‘em out! This is justice! This is what’s right!_ **

She needed to get to the ground now, and thankfully he spotted another stairwell leading into a new building and into the building. She was out on the streets again, and now was making his way down a familiar street. Park Avenue.

**_Here come the enemy mess ‘em up!_ **

More of the robots appeared down the street, charging their laser blasts. This time, Celeste was ready, firing on all of them with the Wispon before rushing through the destruction.

She continued to run, honestly having no idea what she was doing at this point as the robots seemed to fixate on her. 

**_And bring ‘em to their knees do your stuff! Time for justice time to go fight!_ **

Celeste continued to run, taking out more of Eggman’s forces as she went on down Park Avenue leaving a messy trail of scrap in her wake.

She knew she needed a plan. But so far all she had was run and shoot.

Robots came and met the flames as she continued down Park Avenue. 

But soon, she began to tire. She needed to get somewhere safe now.

She arrived in an open area. It was circular in shape and had a loop out in the distance. There were a few buildings there. She thought that one of them would be a good place to hide out. 

But that’s when she heard the marching and looked to see more of the robots.

She now stood surrounded by the robots which all stood a circle around her. She gulped. This was pretty bad. Tired and surrounded. How was she ever going to get out of this. 

She looked on as they prepared to fire and clutched her wispon. There was no other way to do it. She had to fight.

**_Destiny lies before you…_ **

She fired on several of the robots, destroying a few only for them to fire. One clipped her tail, which stung but he continued on.

**_I believe you have the power!_ **

She continued to fire, jumping over a few blasts from more of the Egg Pongs and getting a couple Buzz Bombers.

**_Can you see your horizon?_ **

Celeste only had a few left. But they still returned fire. She fired back, just barely avoiding them. 

**_Victory’s for the taking!_ **

The last of the robots was destroyed and with that they fell to their knees. It was done. It was finished. 

She was exhausted and needed to find somewhere safe quick before she passed out. She staggered to her feet and looked at the buildings around her. Surely one of them would-

And that’s when Celeste heard something else approaching.  _ What more could they possibly want? _ She wondered as he shakily held his Wispon in front of her.

But what she was greeted with was not quite what he expected.

It was a red wolf wearing glasses a green belt, boots and an earpiece of the same color. 

“What in the world?” The wolf said taking in the sight of all the scrap scattered around the area.

Celeste was about to speak, but his breath fell short. The wolf was able to hear the gasp and looked at them.

“Chaos! Kid, did you do this?”

Celeste weakly nodded. 

“Alright. We need to get you out of here. If you really did do this then Eggman’s robots aren’t gonna stop looking for you. Once they get a read on a threat, they won’t stop until they well.. Y’know.”

They nodded but couldn’t help but find it ironic. The robots were the ones who threatened her in the first place. But she supposed that was the way things go.

He pulled out a communicator and pressed a button on the side. “Fierro. Can you get to sector 7G of the city. I’ve got a kid here that took out a whole pack of Eggman Robots. They can’t stay here.”

“Yeah, okay. Understood. Gadget out.”

The wolf, Gadget, then looked at the dog that was slipping out of consciousness. He smiled at her and said, “Don’t worry. Everything will be fine, you’re with the resistance now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And… end chapter. So we met Celeste, Gadget and had the level Sunset Heights. I have plans for Gadget that you’ll find out more about in the next chapter. Of course, if you know me personally then you might already know. But we’ll see about that later, now won’t we?  
> Now what will happen now that she’s with the resistance? Sonic is dead? What happens now? Find out in the next chapter entitled Fighting Onward.


	3. Chapter 2: Fighting Onward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Up to Hololska and into the resistance. Celeste finds her first mission as a member to be crazy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now we arrive on Chapter 3. This is one I’m pretty excited about and can’t wait to start. So… without further ado, let’s check on Celeste.

When she finally came to. She found herself in a white room.

She was lying down on a table of the same color. The room smelled of medicine, she was hooked up to a heart monitor.

She slowly sat up so that she was still on the bed and now leaning against the wall.

Celeste wasn’t really sure where she was, but she figured that she was at least safe if they took the time to take care of her.

That was when the door slid open and in walked in a short cream colored rabbit that couldn’t have been older ten. She wore a little orange dress and shoes of the same color. A Chao flew in behind her.

The rabbit gasped at the sight of the dog awkwardly staring at her. “Uh… hello!”

“Oh my goodness you’re awake!” She then called out of the room. “Mr. Gadget! Mr. Corvin! Ms. Rhythm! Ms. Fierro! Our friend has woken up!”

“Chao! Chao! Chao!” The chao called after her.

She then rushed over to the table and held Celeste’s hand. “How are you feeling? Are you sore? Anything broken?!”

“Chao?! Chao?! Chao?! Chao?!” The chao called after her. 

Celeste chuckled. “Just a little sore.”

“Oh thank goodness. We were so worried about you when you came in.”

“Yeah… where am I?”

“Oh, you’re in the resistance Headquarters. I’m Cream the Rabbit and this is Cheese. I help do a lot of things for the resistance like run the hospital with my mom.”

“Chao! Chao!”

“Huh, nice. I’m Celeste. And Resistance HQ? But that was destroyed. We’re still in Sunset?”

“Well…”

That was when the door slid open again and in walked Gadget as well as a few other new faces.

The first was a turquoise bird wearing a black shirt with two blue arrows on it complete with camo pants and black sneakers.  **[1]**

The next was a pink cat which wore a simple black shirt and a skirt.  **[2]**

Finishing off the group was another rabbit. This one was orange, had messy auburn hair and one of her ears bent down. She wore a black top, skinny jeans and black boots.  **[3]**

All of them looked reasonably older than both her and Cream. Maybe college students if she had to guess.

“Kid! You’re okay!” Gadget beamed, running over to her bedside. “You gave me quite a scare when you passed out!”

“But aren’t you always scared?” The bird smirked at him. 

The rabbit snickered and elbowed him. “Hush, Corvin.” 

“Come on, we can’t deny that Gadget’s a little jumpy.” The rabbit shrugged.

Gadget chuckled and nervously rubbed the back of his head. “Aw. Come on guys, I’m not that bad.”

“Oh no! Is that Eggman walking into the medical bay?!” The bird, Corvin, gasped.

The others laughed and Celeste couldn’t help but giggle herself.

“I only fell for that once!”

“It’s okay, Mr. Gadget. I would’ve been scared too.”

Gadget patted Cream on the back. “Thanks, Cream. At least someone understands me.”

The rabbit smiled.

“But for real, how are you feeling uh... “

“Celeste. And I’m doing better, thanks.”

“That’s good to hear. Anyway, I don’t think I’ve introduced, myself. I’m Gadget.” He smiled. 

The cat spoke up. “Hello. I’m Fierro.”

“The name’s Corvin.” The bird leaned against the wall and gave a two finger salute. 

“Rhythm.” The rabbit nodded.

Celeste smiled. “Nice to meet you all.”

“We’re just really glad you’re okay.” Fierro smiled.

“Yeah. Taking on all those robots like that?” Rhythm asked. “Aw man, that must’ve been a rush.”

“What were you thinking?!” Gadget shouted.

“I dunno. Eggman’s robots just started chasing me and I did what I had to.”

“You definitely showed them who’s boss!” Corvin cheered.

“Sunset needs more heroes.” Fierro nodded. “It’s good what you did.”

She shook her head. “I wouldn’t say I was a hero…”

“A lot of people were saved because you distracted the robots, Ms. Celeste!”

“Don’t be so modest, hon.” Rhythm shook her head. “You did a good thing.”

Celeste blushed. “Thank you…”

They all talked for a little while talking of what went down in Sunset Heights. Apparently the resistance had been on the scene trying to see if they could cut down on the Death Egg Robots on the other side of town. Apparently Silver and Espio managed to deal a bit of damage to a few of them, but none were destroyed. Celeste had learned that she had apparently distracted quite a few of the other units from getting to the resistance with her run down Park Avenue. 

It was all fun and games until the door opened again. This time, standing in the door frame was a red echidna and a pink hedgehog poking her head inside.

Celeste knew exactly who they were. People she’d only seen on TV but there they were standing right in front of her. Celeste didn’t know how to react. It was such an honor to be in the room with them and she just fell silent. What could she say to some of the world’s greatest heroes.

Everyone else in the room straightened at the sight of them. “Commander Knuckles! Captain Rose!” They saluted.

Knuckles dismissed them with the wave of a hand. 

Amy on the other hand shushed them. “Please, none of this captain stuff. I told you all that just Amy is fine.”

“Speak for yourself.” The Echidna chuckled. “I happen to like being Commander.”

Amy shot him a glare.

“I mean, yes. Just Knuckles is fine.”

“Mr. Knuckles, Ms. Amy, what are you doing here?”

Amy shrugged. “We came to check on our patient.” 

She then turned to Celeste. “How are you feeling, honey?”

She stuttered. _ Amy Rose just spoke to her. _ But she had to play it cool. “I-I’m okay. Thank you, Amy.”

“Good to hear.” Knuckles nodded. “Now, there’s the matter of what went down in Sunset Heights and honestly? I’m not sure if I should thank you or slap you.”

“I-I’m sorry…”

“Knuckles!” Amy shouted.

“What? I’m being honest! What this kid did was reckless and stupid. You’re not one of ours so how did you even get a Wispon in the first place?”

“I found it…”

“Wispons go missing all the time, Knuckles;  _ and _ she lives in Sunset Heights. She probably took it to defend herself.”

She shakily nodded her head.

“Still, alerting all of those robots? She could’ve gotten herself killed. What was she thinking?”

“I was scared, I didn’t know what to do. I just ran and ended up fighting the robots.”

“Well… that was stupid.”

Amy shot him a glare.

“Still… you did a lot of good and made a situation better for us. Because of your help, our forces were able to have a better time with the Death Egg Robots. So thank you for that, uh... ”  

“Celeste.” She smiled only for it to fall. She had helped in Sunset Heights, but now what? “What happens to me now?”

“Well, one of two things.” Knuckles said. “We can’t send you back to Sunset.”

“What, but Sunset is-”

“Home. We know.” Amy answered. “We’re sorry, honey. But it’s just not safe for you there.”

“Sunset Heights is far too dangerous a place to live. Especially for you now that all the robots have a beat on you.”

“So what then?”

“We can send you to a refugee camp out in Adabat. Nice and calm and out on the sea. It’ll be like you’re on a vacation and you’ll have the protection of the resistance.”

Celeste couldn’t deny that that sounded nice. The islands of Adabat were such a nice place. She’d be safe.

“Or… you could join the resistance.” Knuckles smiled. “Even if you looked like an idiot in Sunset…”

She chuckled and sheepishly rubbed the back of her head.

“You show some potential. If you join the resistance, you could be a hero. Save people, save Sunset, save the world.”

They all looked at her expectantly, awaiting her answer.

She had a huge decision to make. The choice between fighting or fleeing.

On the one hand, she’d be safe and be able to live it up in Adabat. Surf, sea and sand. Rest and recuperation. What more could she ask for really? 

But at the same time, fighting with the resistance didn’t sound like that bad of an idea. Sure… what happened at Park Avenue, was the stupidest, most stressful situation she had ever gone through. But at the same time… there was a kind of rush of it all. She liked watching the robots be blown to smithereens. But mindless destruction wasn’t enough to be a hero. What was enough was the thought of her home. Sunset Heights had been in danger for so long. If she really did join the resistance, she could help save the world, help save her home.

But she wasn’t a hero like any of the people standing around her. Her run through Park Avenue was a fluke.

Then again, maybe she could fix that. Maybe she could really save her home, save Sunset.

And so that’s how she found herself saying… “Yes.”

“Yes?”

“I’ll join the resistance.”

The others smiled at her. 

Now she was a part of the resistance and well… it would be interesting.

**~Sonic Forces~**

Celeste could tell you that she wasn’t starstruck. But honestly that was a lie. 

She still stood with her new friends. But she was standing amongst world renowned heroes. Team Chaotix! And Silver the Hedgehog! It took everything in her being not to scream at the sight of them. But instead, give Silver a tentative handshake. The Chaotix greeted with waves.

Her near fangirlish death aside, she directed our attention back at the Commander who standing before them.

“Welcome. Glad you could all make it to this meeting.” Knuckles smiled. 

“But you told us if we didn’t get here in the next few minutes, you’d send us out on a mission in Metropolis by ourselves!” Charmy chirped to which he got a slap to the back of the head by Vector.

“Of course, Knuckles was kidding.” Amy said, before shooting a glare at the commander. “Right, Knuckles?”

Knuckles chuckled awkwardly. “Of course.”

“Anyway… What we have here is extremely important. First, I’m sure you’ve all been introduced to the rookie here. Her name is Celeste, we’ll be using this mission to test out her skills.”

“And that mission is?” Corvin asked.

Knuckles nodded to Amy and in a short moment, a holographic image of the globe appeared. Amy did a bit of fiddling with it before it zoomed towards the top of the globe and displayed images of large mechanical buildings rising out of the ocean.

Amy was the one to speak this time. “What you’re looking at is Eggman’s Chemical Plant off the coast of Holoska. Our intel tells us that he carries out experiments here and ships out the results to Green Hill.”  **[4]**

“But that’s not all.” Knuckles added. “Eggman also has an entire fleet of ships in a spaceport just a little off of the Chemical Plant. If we can  _ borrow _ one of the ships, we can take one up to the Death Egg!”

“The Death Egg! That’s perfect!” Silver cheered.

Celeste shuddered at the thought. “Um… the Death Egg? Why is that perfect. It’s well… the Death Egg.”

“The Death Egg is where Eggman has kept our fallen brethren.” Espio explained. “When the resistance base in Sunset had fallen, he gathered a collection of our forces and sent them off to prison in the Death Egg.”

“Any of our boys that old Eggman decides to leave alive gets a one-way ticket.” Vector added.

Celeste gulped at that. “And you want that to be my first mission?”

“Nothing shows character like a dangerous mission.” Knuckles grinned.

Celeste gulped.

“Now the plan is simple. We’re dividing into three teams. First up, the Chaotix will go into the Space Port first from the mainland, Silver and I will take a team and make our way in from the western side of the sea and Betas, you and the rookie will be on the east. We’ll rendezvous in the center of the island where we’ll be able to hijack a shuttle and make our way into the Death Egg.”

“I’ll be monitoring everything from here, of course.” Amy added.

“Everybody okay on the plan?”

Everybody agreed. 

But Celeste had a question. “Uh… Betas?”

“That would be us.” Fierro said.

Standing behind her were Gadget, Rhythm and Corvin .

“We’re Beta Squad! We’re the best of the best of the resistance aside from the heroes like well, the people here.”

“You guys have proven yourselves time and time again. We’d have lost some battles without you guys.” Silver patted Gadget on the back to which the wolf gave him an awkward smile.

“Fierro, you’re one of the best squad leaders in the resistance. There’s no one I’d trust more with the rookie than well… me.” Knuckles nodded to which she saluted. 

She nodded.

“So now that we’ve all got our orders. Let’s go!”

**~Sonic Forces~**

Vector the Crocodile hated the cold.

But this was the mission they were given so he knew he had to go through. The other teams were in their positions and they were in there’s now it was a matter of going through and getting a shuttle.

“Grrrrr It’s freezing.” Vector grumbled.

Espio nodded. “I don’t like it either. But we have our orders.”

“Couldn’t Eggman have picked somewhere warmer to have his big rocket ships in like Seaside Hill or somethin’?”

“But Seaside Hill is for boats, not rockets, silly.” Charmy smiled.

“And sleds are for Holoska, yet the rockets are still here.”

“We must be quiet. Stealth is of the utmost importance on this mission.” Espio chided.

“Yeah, yeah… I got it.” Vector rolled his eyes.

He continued to walk only to step onto the metal of the facility. 

Immediately when he did so alarms started blaring and Egg Pongs appeared before them. 

Amy’s voice crackled to life on the radio. “Several hostiles have appeared in you area.”

“We can see that, Amy. Thanks.” Vector remarked.

The three stood together, ready for battle.

“Alright, Chaotix. Let’s show these creeps what happens when you mess with Chaotix.”

“Right!”

“Yeah!”

**~Sonic Forces~**

Snow drifted calmly onto the chemical plant from the Holoskan skies. Ships flew above the the giant metal constructs, large buildings rose from the waters and the usual twisting paths of Eggman’s chemical plants were present. All of it was covered in a thin blanket of icy snow. 

“Alright, Betas! Rookie! Full speed ahead! We’re hightailing it to the center of the island.” Fierro announced.

They were running along the frozen paths of the chemical plant. 

The rest of the squad cheered at that. 

Celeste liked their enthusiasm as they continued along.

But the path ended. Luckily for them, the resistance had provided them with grappling hooks that they used to swing their way onto the next platform.

Of course, not Corvin. Corvin had an extreme gear which he used to fly there.

That’s when their coms crackled to life. 

“Espio here. We’re engaging the enemy in enemy in the orbital tunnel! I think we can hold them off for now.”

Suddenly a noise rang out. The very familiar sound of distortion. “No, wait!”

Celeste and the squad looked at each other, eyes widened in fear. They knew that noise, everybody in the world knew that noise.

Amy’s voice was the one that came out on the other end. “Espio! Espio! Espio! Team Chaotix, come in!”

“Espio?!” Knuckles cried.

A second passed and finally, it crackled back to life. “Watch out! The masked one is here!” Espio stated that both calmed and disturbed them at what he had said. “The monster that took down Sonic!”

Celeste gasped. That thing was there. The one with seemingly impossible powers that had thrown the world into chaos. And the Chaotix were fighting it, alone. “We have to go back for them!”

Fierro shook her head. “No. We have our orders.”

“But they’re fighting that monster alone! We can’t just leave them!”

Fierro just shook her head and turned away. “Stay focused, Celeste. We’re off to find a shuttle.”

The others nodded and headed off.

Celeste sighed and Gadget put a hand on her shoulder. “Hey, it’ll be alright. Vector and the others are tough and can handle themselves.”

“Right.”

“And we’ve got bigger problems.”

Robots stood in their path, but it seemed the rest of the squad was up ahead. And they were busy.

Fierro took the lead. Using her void wispon, she let out a ball of light that just carried a group of robots away. Before imploding and wiping them away. 

Rhythm was next, she took out her Cube Wispon. It was a hammer shaped into the likeness of the wisp, which she lunged into the air and swung down hard into the ground. It produced a shockwave that encased the robots in front of her into cubes.

Corvin came next, still on his gear he brandished a drill wispon which he charged up and used to propel him and his board into the robots that Rhythm froze.

Then there was Gadget, he had a burst wispon that he used to torch a few of them as well.

Celeste couldn’t let the betas have all the fun though. She had a Lightning wispon now which she got insisting not to steal Gadget’s thunder… By taking the lightning. And so she brought it to life and out came a wisp completely composed of electricity. She swung and took out a few of the robots in her path before following the squad. 

They swung up to the top of one of the buildings and continued on another pathway.

More robots came in their path and they continued to fight.

Amongst the vortexes, flames, lightning and all the robot parts and all, Rhythm spoke up. “Y’know, I think I’ve figured out that song I’m working on.”

“Oh?” Corvin asked. 

“Let’s hear it!” Gadget added.

She swung her hammer and started. “Who is it we’re fighting for? Inside this crazy fire storm, there’s no one left to save the world!”

She hummed. 

Parts flew and more stuff went in as she hummed. 

“In the distance I can see the light of hope, shining… Can’t give in or we’ll lose it all. No surrenderin’ we will carry on, fighting. Battlin’ to win back our world!”

They continued to fight as she sang. Celeste was getting a hang of the whip, letting the thing fly and slice into the badniks all around them. Ironically enough, it was over when she finished humming the tune of her song. 

“Rocked it Rhythm!” Corvin said as he gave her a fist bump. 

She laughed. “The song or the robots.”

“The song. Although, if you ask me, you’re getting a little slow on your swing.”

“I thought you were the one that was slow on that board of yours.”

Corvin gasped and clutched his stomach as if he had been stabbed to which the rabbit laughed.

That was when Celeste spoke up. “That was great! Where’d she learn to do that?” 

Fierro answered. “She’s our resident songbird.”

“Because our actual bird can’t carry a tune.” Gadget laughed.

“Hey!”

Rhythm then answered her earlier question. “I’m a DJ on the Empire City Night Club scene. But I write some of my own songs. Someday, I’m gonna become bigger than Shadi and Li’l Kate!”  **[5]**

“Rhythm’s gonna be huge!” Corvin added.

“After the war though.” She said. “We’ve gotta stop Eggman first.  _ No surrendering, we will carry on… fighting. Battlin’ for a better world! _ ” 

They applauded her and with that the group continued on. They swung onto a new platform that was surrounded by barbed wire only to find themselves face to face with a grind rail.

“Uh… I’ve never used a grind rail before.”

Beta Squad looked at one another before Gadget spoke up.

Gadget was the one who spoke up. “It’s easy. You just get into position and just let the momentum carry you.”

She looked at the thing and still looked scared.

“You guys go ahead. I’ve got this.” Gadget said. The rest of the squad nodded and continued, riding the rail until they were out of view.

“I was scared of these things too.” Gadget said. “But sometimes if you go with a buddy, it can help. So do you wanna go with me, Celeste?”

She nodded. 

So together they went on the grind rail. It was nothing. Celeste wasn’t really sure why she was scared in the first place but she was glad Gadget was there for her.

But when they got off, they found the others atop a large platform fighting a bunch of robots.

They both took out their wispons and charged into battle. 

Celeste let her whip go flying. She swung her whip and it sliced through a few of the Eggpongs. She dodged, she wrapped them up and continue to slice. But what she didn’t notice was how dangerously close they were to the ledge.

When a robot fired at her, she went flying off with a scream.

“CELESTE!” The Beta’s cried out.

She reached out and found some sort of platform but it was moving and moving fast. She climbed aboard only to find it was one of the freight trains. 

In that time, Beta Squad finished off the robots and looked to see that Celeste was fine and had landed on a freight train. The only problem was that it was approaching a tunnel that the youngest member of their party would not be able to fit under.

They all screamed her name.

She looked up only to scream at the sight of the approaching wall. She didn’t know what to do, she was going to die here. Her mind was racing, what was she going to do? She had no means of escape.

Escape!

Her grappling hook!

She could get out of this and she needed to do it now.

She thrust her hand up into the air and fired, not bothering to look for where it went, she needed to get off now and was carried off into the air. 

The wind whipped past her, her ears flopping with it, but soon she was atop the building. But unfortunately atop that building was another railway and with it an approaching train. 

She didn’t think again and just fired the grapple and swung. 

She landed in an entirely different section of the plant. She had no idea where she was but she knew that the best thing to do would be to call the Betas.

**~Sonic Forces~**

“Breathe, Gadget! Breathe!” Fierro yelled. “Calm down!”

They all looked at the hyperventilating wolf. 

Corvin casually handed him a paper bag that he breathed into.  _ In… out… in...  out…  Relax. _

He finally reached a point where he was at the point of breathing. 

“That kid is nuts!”

Corvin smirked. “I like her.”

Fierro sighed. “At least she’s alive… I think. Not very becoming of Beta Squad to lose a rookie on a high priority mission like this.”

That’s when their radio flickered to life.

“Uh… hi?” Celeste’s voice came from the other side.

“You’re alive!” Gadget cried out.

“Where are you?” Fierro asked.

“Uh… i don’t know… I’m in another section of the plant?”

“Can you see anything?”

A moment passed and she answered. “I think I can see the launch pad up ahead!”

“Then go on ahead and we’ll meet at the shuttle.”

“Okay.”

**~Sonic Forces~**

That’s when the radio sparked to life for everyone. It was Silver. “Let’s head in while Espio keeps them busy.”

“We need to get to the shuttle now.” Knuckles said.

“You’re getting close.” Amy said. “All of you should be meeting up shortly. Celeste, looks like you’re the closest.”

She was off, whipping her way through all the robots in her path before she finally arrived on a grind rail leading to the launch pad.

This time she was able to handle it on her own without problem. 

When she finally arrived, there was an open ship waiting for her.

That seemed suspicious. 

She held her wispon cautiously at her side, only for someone to come out. And well, she did not expect her.

“Rouge the Bat?!” 

“Well now, you seem an awful long way from home. Are you lost sweetie? Should I find your mommy?”

“What? No. I-I’m part of the resistance.”

“Must be a new recruit then, cause I’ve never seen your face before. Knuckie otta tell me about these things these days.”

“Knuckie?”

The bat only laughed and that’s when Knuckles, Silver and the rest of the betas arrived.

“Huh, you made it here first, rookie. Good for you.” Knuckles said.

He then addressed the rest of the team. “Alright, we’re all here now. The Chaotix are busy dealing with Eggman’s pet monster so we’re gonna have to head out without them. They’ll be okay though. As long as they’re able to keep him busy it’s less trouble for us on the Death Egg. Now let’s fly out.”

And with that, the rocket shot off into space, their destination? The Death Egg.

**~Sonic Forces~**

The Chaotix stood in the cold, snow fell and they were surrounded by busted robot parts as well as damage to the general area itself; metal was torn to pieces, throwing knives were left stuck to different things or just discarded on the ground, ice had even formed on the ground in patches. It was a mess. They were tired, but had to keep fighting him if the plan was to work.

“The world’s greatest detectives. The master told me that you three would be worthy adversaries, but I never expected you to put up this much of a fight.”

“What can we say, The Chaotix never give up.” Vector smirked. 

“If you can’t handle us, then you should go and cry to your daddy.” Charmy added.

“Can’t handle you?” The being asked only to let out a short laugh. “I’ve only just begun to show off my power and yet you all begin to tire? Not worth my time.”

That’s when they all saw the ship taking off to the Death Egg. Espio couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief at that.

But the thing on the other hand just shook his head. “Tsk, tsk, tsk… And it seems you rabble never learn. Hijacking one of our ships. I’ll deal with you lot now.”

The being was prepared to fly off towards it.

“NO!” They all shouted.

“Your fight is with us!” Espio stated. “If you really are an honorable foe then you’ll finish what you started!”

The being looked between the three fighters and the fleeting spacecraft.

A beat of silence passed before the creature finally adjusted his mask and turned back to them.

“Very well. Let’s finish this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] Corvin the bird. He’s been featured in a lot of art for Sonic Forces, usually the one with the Drill Wispon and most specifically in the official Space Port gameplay reveal.
> 
> [2] Fierro the Cat. This cool cat is everywhere too. She’s usually the one holding the drill wispon in most of the promotional art.
> 
> [3] Rhythm the Rabbit. Okay… so I dunno if Rhythm is actually in promotional art. But I know you can spot her in brief moments in different gameplay and trailers.
> 
> [4] I’ve overanalyzed Forces environments to unhealthy levels. So… yeah. I’m pretty sure the crates in Chemical Plant are the ones in Green Hill.
> 
> [5] They’re the two singer NPCs you help in Sonic Unleashed. I like to think that they became famous. But yeah.
> 
> And that’ll do for Chapter 2. Wow. That was a long one. Closer to 5,000 words? Definitely something I haven’t done in a while, but man. I had fun doing it. So yeah, we’ve done it. A little bit of character development. A little bit of action. It was fun. I had fun with this.
> 
> I’ve been waiting for a while to fit Beta Squad into something and I thought, hey! I can fit them in this fanfiction! I was looking at those four characters one day and started making up character info about them and put ‘em in a squad. They’ll develop a little bit in this too since I already know what I wanna do with them and love ‘em too much. No promises, but maybe if I feel up for it, later I could make a Sonic Forces: Episode Beta sorta deal about them. But like I said, no promises.
> 
> But yeah, that’ll do for this chapter. Next time? I dunno. But hey, I wonder how Tails is doing? Until next time.


	4. Chapter 3: Always a Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lost and alone, young Tails has nothing left in his life. But can a mysterious rift in time change that?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we’re back again. I’m glad that people are enjoying the fic. I’m having a lot of fun with it. Anyways, this one should be a rather short chapter. At least, I think… Here’s to hoping! Haha…

 

While most of the chaos went down in the main sections of Sunset Heights, the southern end of the city was a lot more quiet. Of course that was because Eggman had already had his fun there. It was deserted. Buildings were worn down, had holes in them and didn’t look like they would last much longer, the streets were vacant as if they were never occupied in the first place, fires also were left around. It was truly a sad sight for a city as gorgeous as Sunset Heights to get to have a ghost town within it. But that was the world they lived in.

Miles Prower knew that. There was nothing they could do. It had been a few months since the day that the world fell and his brother was… was… well, he didn’t like to think about that. 

With Sonic gone, his world had been turned upside down and he felt so entirely helpless. So he ran from the problem. He both relished and hated this decision but what could he do now? Even if he wanted to rejoin his friends, he didn’t even know where the resistance was since their old base was destroyed.

Still, Tails wasn’t heartless and that’s how he found himself working on Omega. The once powerful member of Team Dark had been sitting inoperable in Sunset Heights, rusting away for months. He wasn’t sure how exactly he got there, but he had to guess it happened when everything went crazy on that day so many months ago.

So he did the one thing he knew best. He fixed Omega. Or at least, attempted to.

Whatever was going on with his internal circuitry, he had no idea. But there was nothing he couldn’t fix.

Pressing his hand against the face of the robot, he looked into his lifeless eyes. “I’m not giving up on you, buddy… just hold on tight.”

Of course, Omega didn’t respond.

Tails stood there for a moment, just looking into the robot’s eyes for any sign of life. But nothing. He sighed and got back to work.

If he could just get  _ something _ to work then just maybe, just maybe… he’d have at least one of his friends back.

**~Sonic Forces~**

The God of destruction didn’t like going through these strange human villages all that much, but he had to if he wanted to make it in time for the meeting with Eggman and his cohorts.

So that’s how he found himself slinking through the sewers of Sunset Heights. 

This section of town was relatively quiet which he preferred. Reminded him of the calmer days with his brethren before… he couldn’t even think about it. It was too painful. 

They deserved it and he was very thankful for the help of his… friends? No. Not quite. But still, they helped him in his pursuit of revenge and that much was good enough for him

They would pay for what they had done. 

Was there anyone he could take out now. Just to help ease his pain?

Yes… he sensed one. Chaos couldn’t help but smile to himself. He was about to have some fun.  

**~Sonic Forces~**

“And… there.” Tails smiled as he put two wires together. 

But Omega remained unmoving.

“No. I swear I had it this time!”

He deflated. “I’m sorry, Omega…” 

He put a hand against the robot and sighed. Closing his eyes.

_ He just had to keep trying, he’d get it soon… _

But then, Tails ear twitched. He heard something. What was that? Running water?

He turned around and came face to face with none other than Chaos. 

The God of Destruction slunk towards the fox ever so slowly. He loved scaring mortals in this way, making them shake in terror before he finally ended them. 

But for Tails, this was too much. He couldn’t fight. He hadn’t saved Sonic, how could he possibly defend himself against Chaos?! Wait. Chaos. 

This was Chaos 0. He fought against Chaos 4 and won. He shouldn’t have been afraid of him. But still, he shuddered at the sight. Chaos and his friends still took out Sonic.

He tried to stand his ground. “Ch-Ch-Chaos! I-I won’t let you hurt anyone else! Leave me and Omega alone!”

Chaos was a little surprised. Must’ve been one of those resistance members. But nothing they could handle.

He lunged out at the fox only for him to cower in fear. 

Just as he was about to enclose the fox in a watery grave, he sensed something. 

Chaos looked up and was surprised to see a puprle swirling vortex appear.

The ancient deity was flabbergasted by the appearance of the thing, but didn’t expect what happened next.

Out of the portal, fell a new figure. It screamed as it landed right onto Chaos, knocking him all over the place.

When the water splashed onto Tails, he looked to see the figure. They were short pudgy and a very familiar shade of blue. It was a hedgehog. Could it be?

The hedgehog got up to his feet and shook himself off. “Now that was a rush! Okay, where am I?”  **[1]**

“Sonic...? You’re alive?!” Tails asked. 

Sonic looked over to Tails, but didn’t have much time when a fist made of water slammed into him and knocked him into a wall. 

The hedgehog groaned and then looked up at what had hit him to see none other than Chaos preparing to take out Tails.

But he was quick to his feet. “No way I’m gonna let you put a hand on him, ‘ya big drip!”

Chaos looked back at the hedgehog only to be homed into. He splattered again and quickly gathered himself.

Sonic was ready though, spindashing into him and scattering Chaos’ parts again.

This one was proving a formidable foe. He knew he couldn’t stay here. He’d get a chance at this one sometime later, it was time to retreat.

And so with that, chaos slunk back into the sewer.

“Aw come on, where ‘ya goin?” Sonic shouted after it. 

He shrugged and then zipped over to Tails. The fox was surprised when an arm had suddenly wrapped around his shoulder.

“Did ‘ya see me, Tails? I told ‘ya everything would be okay! Eggman and that heavy loser were no match for me!”

Tails looked at him confusedly. “What?”

“Sure, you don’t remember…?” And that’s when he got a look at his younger- or well older brother. 

“Tails?” 

And that’s when Tails got a good look at the blue blur and saw that it also wasn’t his Sonic. But… “You’re the younger Sonic from the past, aren’t you?”

Sonic shrugged. He didn’t expect to see the older Tails again until well… Tails was that age. “Uh… yeah. I guess I am. Are we in a weird white limbo thing again?”

Tails shook his head. “No. This is our world. Or well… the future for you.”

“Right… time travel.  _ Again… _ And here I thought that I was done with that sort of thing until well, I guess that happens to me again later.”

“Guess not. Do you know how you got here?”

“Sure.” Sonic shrugged. “But you probably remember that. I was super and uh… Eggman and his robot played hot potato with his Phantom Ruby thing and I guess it and the chaos emeralds opened up a portal and next thing I knew, I’m here.”

Tails didn’t remember anything like that, but this Sonic was looking at him expectantly. “That makes sense… I think?”

He shrugged. “‘Ya got me, buddy.”

“Well… everything happens for a reason right? We need to save the world, so maybe you’re here to help save the world!”

Sonic promptly nodded.

“Either way, it’s good to see you, Sonic. Heck, it’s good to see any Sonic.”

Sonic threw an arm around Tails. “Sonic and Tails, out on another adventure!”

Tails laughed. He hadn’t done that in so long, but with Sonic or well… a Sonic here, it was at least he knew where he was headed. 

And that’s when a beep chimed next to them.

They looked towards the source of the noise and saw Omega rising to his feet with a grating screech.

“Omega, you’re back!” Tails cheered.

**“I am E123-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e 4-5-6-12- red-black-finite-Ruby-y-y-y-y-y-y!”**

“Or not…” Sonic chuckled.

Omega steamed and sputtered for a moment before he finally stopped. He turned towards them and looked them in the eyes.  **“Designation unknown. Alias required.”**

“You are E123 Omega.” Tails said.

**“E123 Omega registered.”**

“Looks like your robot’s busted.” Sonic said as he watched Tails looking into his circuitry again.

“Actually, it’s not mine. It’s one of Eggman’s.”

“And you’re helping it?” 

“A lot has changed. Omega’s one of our friends.”

Sonic just looked confusedly at him. “The future’s weird.”

Tails finally closed the hatch and frowned. “Looks like his memory chip is fried. There’s nothing that I can do from here.”

“So… what then?”

“Maybe if I could get to my lab down in the mystic ruins but that’s all the way down in Soumerica. We’d have to cross the entire continent for that. And well the Tornado I was using was destroyed with the resistance base.”

“That’s not a problem for us.” 

“Well…”

“Come on, Tails… ‘ya all fancy in the future now and can’t go for a good run?”

“What? No!”

“Then come on!”

Tails smiled. “Right. Omega, follow!”

The robot complied and followed after them and like that Sonic and Tails were off again, out on another adventure. 

And so they were off through the war torn streets. Chaos didn’t come back so the two of them just talked as they ran while Omega wordlessly followed along.

“So… what’s up with the future. Why is this place so… wrecked?”

Tails sighed. “Eggman won.”

“Eggman what?!” 

“He won. I don’t know how, he had this weird new weapon with him. This robot thing that was able to turn the world around. He has control of the everything now.”

“Well, what about me?” 

Tails looked away. 

Sonic’s smile fell. “Oh…”

“I’m sorry, Sonic. They ganged up on you and Eggman’s new thing was just way too fast and-”

“Too fast? Nothing is ever too fast for me. What he do, catch me when I was warming up?”

He shook his head. “No, Sonic. This thing is faster than you. I don’t know how but… it was.” 

“Well it better hope it doesn’t run into me then. I’ll show Eggman’s tincan what happens when you mess with me.”

Tails looked at him sadly. 

Sonic’s glare softened at that and was about to say something about it, but Omega spoke up.  **“Incoming hostiles.”**

Both of them looked to see a couple of Eggpongs coming in. They were at the edge of Ghost Town and approaching the Red Gate Bridge. Now however, a squadron of Eggpongs were about to get to them, there were five.

**“Destroy those blocking the path of our objective!”**

Omega then turned his arms into guns and fired at one of the robots, destroying it instantly.

“Wow!” Sonic gasped. “This guy packs a lotta heat. But two can play that game!”

With that, he jumped into the air and homed in on one of the robots, destroying it instantly.

One of the others tried to fire on him, to which he quickly rolled out of the way. Tails was quick to defeat it, swiping his namesakes at the machine.

Sonic was able to back it up with a spindash to another one of the robots while Omega finished it up by firing on another one of the robots.

“Too fast, too quick.” Sonic smirked, dusting off his hands. “Eggman’s getting bored if this is what his robots look like these days. No creativity.”

Tails laughed. “Y’know, I was thinking the same thing.”

Sonic offered his brother a high five that he gladly returned.

The hedgehog then turned to the robot and added, “And you too, tincan! Nice moves you got there. Come on, top shelf!”

The robot stared blankly at him. 

Tails chuckled. “You’re gonna have to forgive Omega. He’s not himself. Even then he doesn’t really understand everything we do.”

Sonic shrugged and instead gave him a pat on the back. “Well, good job buddy.”

They continued walking and very quickly found themselves in the main town, making idle chit chat while Omega followed along. It mostly had to do with Tails asking random questions about both Eggman’s domination and ust general future stuff. 

“So you’re telling me that I get a hoverboard that’s so co-ooooooooooooool...” Sonic trailed off.

His eyes were now on the massive Death Egg Robots that were making waste to the town. There were so many of them. Sure, the other part of town had been destroyed. But this? This was too many of them and they were so big! Far larger than any of them he had taken on.

“Look at all these Death Egg Robots!” 

“Yeah… Eggman brought them in a few months ago. They already took out the part of the city we were just in and I guess they moved on.”

“That’s terrible! We gotta do something!” 

“Well what do you wanna do? There’s no way we can take so many of them on.”

“There’s always a way, Tails. If there’s anything I taught you that I thought you would remember, I hoped it would at least be that.” 

Tails frowned, but Sonic put a hand on his shoulder and smiled at him.

“I have a plan.”

**~Sonic Forces~**

**“All Eggman robots must be destroyed!”** Omega announced as he fired at one of the Death Egg Robots.

The bullets flew off of the Metal shell as if it were nothing, but got the attention of the massive robot, to which the robot fled. It was odd seeing Omega run and not be himself, but nothing they could do at the moment. 

The robot threw a fist down at where Omega was, an empty street that was out of the way and that’s when Sonic and Tails appeared, climbing up the arm of the robot. 

Once they reached the top, they ran around the top before they reached it single eye.

“Alright! Here it comes!” Sonic shouted getting ready to spindash into the lense. 

But it started to glow to which the hedgehog’s eyes widened. 

“MOVE!” Tails shouted as he grabbed him by the arms and jumped off of the thing, flying into the air.

The laser fired into the air and missed them.

Sonic looked up at his friend and smiled. “Knew I could always count on you, buddy!”

Tails grinned and then looked down on the Death Egg Robot. He took on a mischevious grin and smiled at his friend. “How about a little boost, Sonic?”

“Let’s roll, Tails!”

And with that, the fox spun around in the air, before he threw the hedgehog at the Death Egg Robot. He curled into a ball and a familiar blue aura surrounded him. 

He smashed through the eye and the rest of the body causing the thing to freeze.

He landed on the ground on both feet with his hands up in the air and eyes closed. 

“And that’s how it’s done.” He said as he took a bow and the Death Egg Robot exploded behind him.

“Come on Tails! Let’s take on another!”

Tails agreed and Omega… well, Omega didn’t really have a say, he just did whatever someone told him.

The next one they took on, they took by running around and around it in circles causing it to spin around and around in an attempt to smush them, but to no avail. Soon it had done it so much, the the top of the robot spun right off. 

They continued on this path and by the time the day was done they had taken four Death Egg Robots.

Unfortunately for them, that was only a fraction of the army and they were getting tired. Tails opted that they retreat to the Red Gate Bridge and head towards Green Hill.

Now they sat on the bridge looking out at the eternal twilight of Sunset Heights. It was gorgeous as the orange sun blended with the water out there.

Rusted metal shone in the light, tails lightly swayed back and forth and feet were lazily kicking over the edge. 

“We may not have saved the whole town, but taking out those Death Egg Robots were bound to help out.” Tails smiled.

Sonic nodded. “For sure.”

“Thanks Sonic.”

“For what?” 

“Just for being here. I know it was an accident, but if you didn’t show up, I don’t know what I would’ve done.”

Sonic nodded. “I’d always do anything for you, older or younger or whatever. You know that.”

Tails smiled and nodded. “I know and I’d do the same for you.”

They sat there looking out at the Sunset for a little while longer before Sonic finally spoke up again.

“Do you remember times like these, Tails?” 

The fox looked at him.

“Y’know, wherever we ended up for a night we’d always just sit together and just appreciate the view? Well, I guess I still do that in my time. But like, now that you guys have nice cushy homes and everything. Do you remember how we’d just look out at the sunset and the stars and everything and just enjoy the view?”

“Of course. You always used to tell me everything would be okay no matter what.”

“Did you still do that with me before…?”

“Not a lot.” Tails admitted. “You’re always running around, going wherever your feet take you. But sometimes, when we’re out adventuring or even back to my workshop, you always ask me to come over and look out there with you.”

Sonic smiled. “Well, buddy. Remember that as long as you’re looking out there, there’s always gonna be a way. We’ll beat Eggman like we always do and you’ll see that nothing’s impossible.” 

Tails smiled. Together, the brothers, separated by fate, time and space looked out at the sunset. Tails wasn’t sure how exactly but with the other Sonic here, they were gonna win this war. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] Chill. Unlike Sega, I have a plan for Classic Sonic.
> 
> So this is the first chapter that I am really, truly am proud of. The others I’m somewhat mixed on, but this one? ‘Ey, now that’s what I’m talkin’ about. I know what changes I’m gonna make and you’ll find that out in the next chapter when we return to the others. Next chapter is gonna be a ton of fun, but is likely gonna be a long one because we’ve got a heck of a lot of ground to cover in that one. It’s gonna be a lot of fun and more than you expect.
> 
> But as for Classic Sonic, I just wanna bring up something. For one, I love the track “It’s Good to See a Sonic” because I love that orchestral Mania theme. It’s awesome and I love it. If I were in charge of Forces, I would’ve made that Classic Sonic’s motif for the game. It would really make it feel like it’s a direct continuation to his adventures in Mania. Mix it in with a little I Wanna Fly High and bam, we have the music for Tails and Classic Sonic’s adventure. But that’s just me.


	5. Chapter 4: Jailbreak- Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The resistance make their way up to the Death Egg in this chapter while Infinite is still up north fighting the Chaotix. Can they survive all of the traps?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we’re back again for another chapter. We’re gonna be going to the Death Egg. Something you should know first is that after some thought, I decided to nerf Wispons and am gonna limit their attacks in different ways because they’re just way too powerful to write good fight scenes with. Which is why. As for why it’s been a month? Uh... check the end A/N. But with that, let’s get started. But first, review replies:

 

Celeste should’ve known that she was going to die in a place with the word death in the title. Still? Being surrounded by a bunch of robots was not the way she had planned to go. 

But with the robots having their blasters trained on her, she prayed that this would be quick. 

**~Sonic Forces~**

**SOMETIME EARLIER**

 

Eggman smiled to himself as Chaos entered the room, the meeting was about to start and now all that was missing was his newest toy.

He loved everything that was happening. The world was his! All of it! This time he had actually done it. The past few months had been incredible! 

Sure, there was the resistance but it wasn’t like they could do anything at this point? He just toyed with them. They weren’t going to defeat him, he ruled the world!

Shadow was the one that spoke up. “When’s your friend getting here, Doctor?”

“He should be here shortly.”

Zavok rolled his eyes. “For someone that orchestrated the destruction of this world, he’s taking his time.”

Eggman glared at him. “ _ I _ orchestrated the destruction of this world. All of you are pawns I’ve strung along for the ride and don’t you forget it.”

Metal beeped in agreement.

“Really now? Then perhaps I should tell the little miscreant of your true feelings.”

“He knows what he is.”

“Then you shouldn’t have a problem with me telling him.”

Eggman glared at Zavok who just glared back. The two were in a stalemate for a moment.

Eggman snapped his fingers. “Chaos and Metal, help me glare at Zavok.”

Metal snapped to attention and immediately glared at the demon.

Chaos on the other hand looked confusedly at the two.

Shadow groaned and face palmed. “Enough of the chatter! What have you called us here for, Doctor?”

Eggman sighed, slinking back into his chair. “I suppose we’ll have to start without him. Please, take a seat, gentlemen.”

The four sat around him in a conference table. 

“Sonic.”

Shadow rolled his eyes. “Tsk. What about him?”

“He’s been rotting away in his cell for too long. We already made an example to the world of defeating him, but that resistance keeps defying us at every turn.”

“What does that have to do with him?”

“That resistance continues to have hope. They continue to gain members by the day. But if we were to show the world that he’s gone then...”

Zavok grinned. “You’re finally going to dispose of him! I would’ve done it ages ago.”

“And yet you didn’t.”

“Because you wouldn’t let me!”

“And I still think we should wait.” Shadow argued.

All of them raised an eyebrow at turned to look at the ulttimate life form.

“Destroying Sonic at this point would only make the people rally even further. You’d have more of a problem than you already do on your hands.”

“Besides… I like torturing the faker.”

“NO! That fool needs to be destroyed!” Zavok slammed his hands on the table. “Do not listen to this fool. We need to rid ourselves of the hedgehog now!”

“And we will.” Eggman stated. “I’ll plan an execution. The world should see their Emperor and his generals before we get rid of him for good.”

“I should deliver the finishing blow.” Zavok insisted.

“We’ll decide on the details when our friend gets here. I’ll give him a call.”

**~Sonic Forces~**

The ship landed in the hangar of the Death Egg without raising any attention.

“Alright, who’s going out first?” Knuckles asked them.

The group looked surprised at him. “Commander?”

“What? I’m not going out there first, it’s the Death Egg. I’m surprised we weren’t shot out of the sky when we came.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be our fearless leader?” Celeste asked.

“I’m fearless but I’m not stupid.”

Rouge chuckled. “Poor little Knuckie shaking in his boots over a couple of Eggman’s toys.”

“What, that’s not-”

“I’ll go first.” Rouge said brushing past him and opening the door.

“Hey, wait up!” Knuckles called out as he followed after her.

They came out of the ship only to find an empty hangar. Nothing was there.

“Huh, we’re not dead.”

“I would hope so, I took great care to make sure that everything would be okay.”

“Ri-right. Sorry.”

Rouge smiled and patted him on the back before walking away towards the door.

The others walked over with Knuckles.

“Based on the schematics of the Death Egg, we should have some time before we get there. Amy, what’s our route looking like?”

“You guys will have to sneak through a couple of halls before you get to the prison at the center of the facility. Don’t worry, I’ll guide you.”

“Alright everybody, let’s go.” Knuckles said, waving them through the mechanical door.

**~Sonic Forces~**

The masked one surged towards the Chaotix, surrounded in that red energy.

Each of them were quick to dodge, diving in different directions.

Espio landed in a crouch and chucked a kunai at him, but the jackal fired a beam of light that disintegrated the throwing knife into nothing. 

He fired again, this time at the Chameleon, hitting him square in the chest and knocking him back. 

“Hey, you’re not hurtin’ my buddy like that and gettin’ away with it!” Vector shouted. With that, he fired off a music note at the jackal which he simply redirected into Charmy with the simple wave of a hand.  **[1]**

Charmy cried out as he was knocked into a wall.

Vector growled at this. Projectiles weren’t going to work, so he tried the more direct approach. With a yell, he reared back his fist and ran at the masked being. 

When the crocodile was upon him, he simply chuckled and in that moment, he disappeared from sight and in his place appeared Espio. 

Vector gasped and pulled his fist back, but that didn’t stop his momentum as he stumbled into Espio.

“Pathetic.” The being rolled his eyes.

But that was when he heard a shrill yell come from behind him.

He turned around only to come face to face with a massive stinger that struck him in the stomach just below the gem.

“I got him, guys!” Charmy cheered.

The two just got out of their entanglement and groaned only to shout at their friend to get away.

Charmy didn’t really bother to guess where but quickly flew towards them just for a laser to barely miss him. 

The creature rose into the air above them. “You lot are putting up far more of a fight than I’d have imagined. It’s been some time since I’ve been given a proper challenge. The rest of your ranks go down far too easily.”

The three glared at him at that statement, how easily he talked of the resistance members that had either been slaugthered or imprisoned by him was unacceptable. 

“We fight for our friends and refuse to let any of them be hurt by the likes of you again.” Espio snapped.

“And you’re not leaving here until we’re through with you!” Espio added.

“The Chaotix are gonna make hotdogs out of you!” Charmy declared. 

The three of them gave him looks of confusion at that, even Infinite. 

“Y’know, cuz he’s a jackal and jackals are dog and well hotdogs cuz we’re gonna destroy him and like eat him and…”

Infinite just rolled his eyes. “Enough of this foolishness. You can’t possibly expect to defeat me.”

“We know we will. Come on boys!” Vector shouted.

They charged towards him, each preparing their own attacks to which he flew at them, leaving a red trail in his wake. 

**~Sonic Forces~**

The small team of resistance fighters had been sneaking down the halls of the Death Egg for a while, making sure to stay away from anything that might cause them trouble. Amy had been their guide, reading the schematics of the Death Egg from their base.

All of them had their guard up and were keeping their guard up, they were safe for now, but that could change at any moment in one of Eggman’s most guarded places. 

Celeste especially was shaking like a leaf, jumping at the sight of anything that could possibly come their way. Even Gadget was less frightened than her and had to often tell her to calm down. 

“This next room should be empty, pass through it and you’ll be getting close to the prison soon.”

“Thanks, Amy.” Knuckles nodded.

They stepped into the room to find themselves in a dome of sorts. A single square platform was suspended in the air by a few pathways that lead into doors that lead all kinds of different directions. But above was a glass ceiling that gave them view of the stars and a bit of their great planet Mobius. 

A lot of them couldn’t help but gasp at the sight, Silver included. 

“I just got a great idea for an album cover guys.” Rhythm couldn’t help but blurt out.

Knuckles and Rouge on the other hand continued on, having seen all of it before. It wasn’t their first time in space and something told Celeste that it wouldn’t be their last. But still, the sight of all of it was enough to leave them all stunned. 

So stunned that they all nearly jumped out of their skin when the alarms started blaring.

“Shoot!” Knuckles barked as robots began to rise up all around them on several platforms. Sleek, metallic versions of the Egg Pongs were there along with several buzzer bombers.

“Looks like we’ve got company.” Rouge mused as she flew to one of the Buzzer Bombers and gave it a swift kick to the face, turning it to scrap metal.

“Everyone stick together!” Silver shouted. “We may have been discovered but let’s show them what happens when you mess with the resistance!”

And with that they attacked.

Gadget had managed to use his burst wispon on them, he dove out of sight of several lasers but was able to fire bursts of flames at them that were able to decimate the robots.

Knuckles decided to use his namesakes to show them what he was made of, using them to punch through the opposition and proving that he was rougher than the rest of them. 

Fierro’s weapon was very limited and needed to recharge at times. So she found herself punching and kicking several of the robots. She didn’t see the need to unleash a black hole just yet.

Rouge did the same, although she was in the air, chasing after a lot of the Buzzer Bombers and actually had quite a bit of fun doing it. She couldn’t help but laugh when they broke apart by her hand. Knuckles couldn’t help but notice and wonder when she started to enjoy fighting robots so much but chalked it up to Shadow and Omega rubbing off on her. 

Corvin was having a blast, opting to take out his gear and distract some of the Buzzer Bombers himself. They fired on him as he whizzed around, but he did tricks to dodge their shots and sent lots of quips their way before ramming into them with his drill wispon or guiding them into walls.

Silver lifted robots using his telekinetic abilities and either chucked them off the edge of the platform, slammed them into walls and sometimes each other.

Rhythm had fun freezing robots into blocks and crushing them with her hammer.

As for Celeste, she was having fun of her own as well, she found great use with her lightning wispon. With the flick of a wrist, she was able to send the short trail of lighting into the robots and break them apart. It was fun.

Parts went flying as the resistance continued to wreak havoc in the base as the alarms continued to blare. 

The fight was on. 

**~Sonic Forces~**

“Why shouldn’t we throw him out into space?” Eggman groaned. “It would be the perfect occasion live on television.” 

“The best way to take care of our problem would be a live execution.” Zavok insisted. “Let me do it and strike fear into the hearts of them all.”

Shadow pinched his nose as the two continued to go at it.

“Banishment!” 

“Execution!”

“Banishment!”

“Execution!”

“Banishment!”

“Execution!”

“Banishment!”

“BE QUIET!” 

Bot of them looked at Shadow again.

Zavok narrowed his eyes at him. “You dare to raise your voice at me-”

Suddenly the alarm started going off around them, cutting off the Zeti and making them all look up and around in confusion. 

“What’s going on?” Zavok asked.

“The alarm went off. We have a breach in security!” 

With that, the door slid open and in rushed Orbot and Cubot, the former of which was carrying an electronic clipboard. “Boss! Boss!”

“Nincombots! What’s going on?”

“You need to check the main feed right now!” Cubot shouted.

They frantically handed Eggman the clipboard only for his eyes to widen in surprise. “What? They’re here in the Death Egg now?!”

“What’s wrong, Doctor?”

“The resistance is here and I need to make a call right away!”

**~Sonic Forces~**

The Chaotix all lunged at the jackal only for him to fire lasers from his hands at Vector and Charmy. 

He was ready to get one for Espio, but the Chameleon was too quick, knocking him out of the sky.

With him pinned down, Espio was quick to produce a knife ready to plunge into the beast. It looked up at the chameleon’s face and saw the knife in hand. 

Underneath the mask, he furrowed his brow and with a yell he let out a wave of energy that knocked the chameleon into a pile of snow.

“Espio!” The two other Chaotix cried out.

The two glared at the monster and ran to him, Espio with a bubblegum blast, and Charmy with his stinger out.

He approached Charmy and rammed him from the side before quickly spinning around to Vector and fired a laser at the bubble. It popped covering the crocodile in the sticky stuff.

Vector blinked and tried to get it off of him.

Espio and Charmy were quick to meet him and help pry the stuff off of him.

“Well, I had no idea this is what you meant by a team sticking together.” He mused. “But I can’t say I am too fond of this technique.”

They finally got him free and stared down the thing. 

“We’ll show you what a team can really do.” Vector stated.

Espio held his hands out. “Chaotix together!”

“Yeah!” Charmy cheered.

They were just about ready to charge him again, the battle was about to continue and it was going to be fierce. 

Except, that wasn’t going to happen as edgy music started playing from his helmet. 

“Uh… what is that?” Charmy asked.

The monster just facepalmed. 

“Music and lemme tell you, this is not a jam.” Vector added.

Espio shrugged. “I dunno, I kind of like it.”

_ I am the tallest of mountains, _

_ I am the roughest of waves,  _

_ I am the toughest of terrors,  _

_ I am the darkest of days _

The edgy emo smack rap just kept going and going and the Chaotix stared at him.

The beast just sighed. “One moment, please.”

With a wave of his hand, crackling red electricity appeared around the Chaotix and froze them in place. With that, the beast clicked the side of his mask and the music stopped.

“What do you want?!”

“There you are! Do you have any idea how long we’ve been waiting for you!” Eggman screeched on the other end of the line.

“I have been preoccupied with some of the resistance fighters. What did you call them? The Chaotix? They have proven to be far more of a challenge than you had let on.”

“The rabble never cease to surprise.” Eggman mused. But then returned to his serious tone. “I need you on the Death Egg now. The resistance is here and we need to get rid of them.”

He growled and looked between himself and the Chaotix. 

He wasn’t one to leave a fight. He didn’t want too. Eggman continued to keep talking but he just ignored him. He needed to finish this fight. 

“I will return, Doctor.”

“Good, we’ll meet yo-”

“After I am through with these three.”

With that, he hung up and unfroze the Chaotix only for the three of them to lunge at him and knock him into the snow.

He looked up at them and smirked underneath the mask. 

_ Time for fun. _

**~Sonic Forces~**

Eggman growled. “He’s not coming.”

Shadow couldn’t help but chuckle. “Seems like our friend has another agenda.”

“We have no options then. We’ll have to handle it ourselves!” 

He then turned to the monitors and looked down on them. 

“We can’t allow them to get to the prison, if they do, then they might find him.”

He turned to them. “We’re launching a counterattack! Metal Sonic. You’re going in there now to catch them off guard. But whatever you do do not engage.”

Metal Sonic nodded and flew out of the room.

“ Chaos will drown them out, make sure that they won't be able to make it out of there alive.”

Chaos gurgled and left as well.

“Shadow, I want you to be on standby. Should Sonic escape, we'll need someone to chase him down immediately. We can’t allow him to get out of our clutches!” 

Shadow huffed and leaned against the wall. He took that as confirmation enough.

“And Zavok, I want you to-”

Shadow chuckled. “Bad news, doctor.”

Eggman turned to see only Shadow there. Zavok had disappeared.

The doctor’s eyes widened in surprise, only for that surprise to turn to blistering furry.

**_“Where…. is… Zavok?!_ ** ” The Doctor let out an almost primal growl that shocked the ultimate life form.

Deep within the prison, the leader of the Deadly Six approached a prison cell, its occupant: The fastest thing alive.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun-a-na-na-na-naaaaaa-na-na-na-BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM-DUM!  
> That short Deadly Six riff intensifies. 
> 
> [1] I decided that since Vector’s shtick is music too that I’d give him the music notes from that horrid Generations mission as an attack as well.
> 
> I’m gonna end this chapter here. It was originally gonna move onto other stuff, but I realized that holy cow. It’s nearly been a month and that’s not fair to you guys. So that’ll do for this chapter. Expect the next one relatively soon (a weekish? Two?) since I’ve already made a ton of headway on that. Don’t worry, I considered originally ending this chapter here anyway, but then thought “Nah, I can make it.” only to realize a bit into writing the next one, “Holy crap, it’s been a week.” So that’ll do for this chapter.  
> Read and review.


	6. Chapter 5: Jailbreak- Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part 2 of the confrontation on the Death Egg.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we’re back for the next chapter of Sonic Forces. While I would’ve preferred to keep this chapter long, I figured that I’d split it since you guys have been waiting so long. But now, I’m here for the next one which is actually the last one and lol. Let’s just go.

 

 

The resistance was making quick work of the robots and the room was almost cleared out as parts continued to go flying.

“Let’s wrap this up, team! We need to move forward and get to the prison now!” Knuckles shouted.

“You heard the boss!” Fierro agreed as she pulled out her wispon. “Silver, can you give me a little help?”

“On it!”

The hedgehog said. With that he glowed with his green aura as it surged all over the room, pulling all of the bots in the room together into a ball.

Fierro then pulled out her charged Void Wispon and fired a ball of energy at the robots.

The effect was almost instantaneous, all of the robots got sucked into the void until there was absolutely nothing left. The power on those things was ridiculous and Celeste couldn’t help but want one for herself.

But still, all the robots were gone and the resistance were able to breathe a sigh of relief. 

Knuckles turned to them and smiled. “Okay, now that that’s done, we’ve gotta head to the prison.”

“They’re bound to be on high alert now, so we better hurry.” Rouge added.

“Where to then?” Silver asked Amy.

“Not important right now. Incoming hostile at the four o’clock corridor.”

Before they could even react, a loud whoosh could be heard at that moment.

Everybody’s blood went cold at that, especially Knuckles’ and Rouge’s. With all the adventures they’d been on there had been some pretty great sights, sure. But there was also some pretty great danger. 

So when they heard that noise, they only had to give one fearful glance at one another before Knuckles reacted.

“EVERYONE DOWN, NOW!”

They didn’t really have time to argue when they dove at his command. And it was a good thing too because at that very moment, in came the original Metallic Madman: Metal Sonic.

“Captain Rose, confirmed sighting of Metal Sonic on the Death Egg!” One of the random soldiers shouted into their com.

From the other end, Amy let out a sharp shriek. The once calm and collected tactical operator of the resistance was now left in a frenzied mess at the very mention of the robot’s name. “Metal Sonic?! You all need to abort mission now!”

She knew the full extent of what that thing could do. She’d been in its clutches herself. Before the war, Metal had been branded one of the most dangerous beings on the planet, and it was a machine! But now, being one of the generals of Eggman’s army and having taken so many lives, there was no question in her mind.

Metal didn’t take prisoners. Zavok did. Shadow did. Chaos did when he was told. Even that creep that was fighting the Chaotix did. But Metal Sonic? They were goners.

But Knuckles didn’t feel the same way. “Do not abort!” Knuckles shouted.

“Knuckles no!”

“Metal isn’t doing anything. We’ve got like 20 of us here, we can take him!”

And he was right. Metal Sonic was just floating in the sky and staring at them. He didn’t do anything.

“Come on guys, it’s nothing. With our strength we can end Metal once and for all!”

“No, Knuckles! If Metal isn’t doing anything then that means… it’s a trap.”

Suddenly another blip appeared on the map and was approaching fast. “ANOTHER HOSTILE INCOMING! YOU GUYS NEED TO GET OUT OF THERE!”

But it was too late. This time, it was Chaos who appeared before them. 

In a single moment, the monster flooded the room, dividing the resistance and sending them down different hallways before shutting the doors and leaving them to fend for themselves.

**~Sonic Forces~**

Celeste wasn’t sure where exactly she had ended up but she knew that she was alone. The other resistance members had been pushed by the waves and were separated from each other. She didn’t see anybody. On the one hand she was thankful because anybody included both Metal Sonic and Chaos. But on the other hand, none of her friends in the resistance. No Knuckles, no Rouge, no Betas… 

But she did have her com and at least with Amy’s guidance she could at least rendezvous with the others. 

So she turned it on.

Immediately, she was met with the loud chatter of the resistance on the other end. And it was loud.

Most of them were scared and she could pick out Gadget’s frantic voice, Knuckles was trying his best to give out commands and that ended up warranting a lot of yelling from the echidna and Amy was the one trying her best to keep everything down.

So much was going on and Celeste was kinda taken aback by it all, with all the shouting. 

Finally, it was Amy who had had enough. 

“BE QUIET!” She shouted.

And with that everybody shut up.

“Good! Now. It’s clear that things have been going south here so that means we’re going to have to make our exit in a calm and orderly manner, do we understand?”

“Amy, the prisoners!” Knuckles retorted.

_ “We’ll come back for them.” _

Knuckles growled on the other end, while Amy took charge. “Now seeing as Celeste was one of the few to be calm about it, I’ll guide her out of here first. Honey, can you hear me?”

“L-loud and clear, Amy.” 

“Good. From where I see you located on the map, it looks like you’re gonna have to take quite a long run. There’s a path that’ll take you on a downward spiral. You’re gonna have to go there. It looks like you’re actually the only one who passes by the prison. But don’t do anything unless I tell you to.”

“R-right.”

And with that, she took off down the hall and sure enough she did find the downward spiral entirely made of a glass like material that she had sprinted down. It was long, and kind of ridiculous, but she continued on. But at the very least on her way down, she didn’t encounter any enemies. 

It wasn’t long before she made her way into another room, this one much larger than the last that had an actual stairwell leading down the facility. 

It didn’t creep her out that this room was much darker than the one before or the fact there were these metallic machines mounted on the walls that seemed to follow her, she just followed Amy’s directions. Escape was her biggest concern right now, so she ignored the creepy stuff. 

Amy’s com chimed to life. “It looks like you’re in the main prison now, Celeste.”

She looked around, confusedly. “Really, this place? It’s so empty?”

“Empty?!” Everyone shouted back at her.

“Rouge, what the heck?!” Knuckles shouted.

“I don’t understand either, the prison is clearly meant to be at that part of the Death Egg. Amy, are you sure that she’s in the right place?”

“Where I read her, it shows that she’s right where the schematics label the prison.”

“So what then?” Knuckles asked.

Fierro was the one to chim in this time. “Captain, I think the prisoners were moved then. If they really aren’t where they’re supposed to be then that’ll mean that Eggman took them somewhere else.”

“Of all the dirty tricks!” Knuckles growled.

“Still believe we should save them, Knuckles? We don’t even know where they are now.”

He sighed. “We need to get out. Find a new way to save the prisoners and figure out where they are soon.”

“Looks like I’ll have my work cut out for me.” Rouge mused.

Celeste had been walking down the halls jumping onto platforms and making her way out of the prison. To see things so empty was awful.The people could be anywhere. Who knows what Eggman did with them? They had all come so far and the fact that her first mission turned out to be a bust saddened her more. 

Of course, Prison Hall wouldn’t be empty for long. She heard the metal thud behind her.

She gulped and hoped to Gaia that it was just her imagination, since Chaos wasn’t really doing wonders for her or the world lately. So slowly and shakily she turned around to see five Egg Pawns approaching her. Just her luck.

Still, she took out her wispon and got to work. 

With a flick of a wrist, the wispon flickered to life and she took out the head of the pack.

The others the pointed their blaster arms and fired on her and she let out a yelp as she dove under the fire, her wispon falling to the floor.

She sloppily crawled on all fours and scooped up her weapon before finally rising to her feet, clumsily scampering about. She whipped out again, this time taking out two of the robots and leaving two remaining.

She jumped up over another blast and swung down on another one of them.

She then landed in a crouch and let the whip fly again and destroying the last of them.

She smiled. She defeated the robots no problem. All by herself.

And then the alarm went off. She frowned and threw her hands over her ears. But continued onward. She couldn’t stay in one place, she had to keep moving.

“Looks like they’re on high alert now.” Rouge mused.

Corvin’s voice came out next. “You mean, Chaos and Metal wasn’t them being on high alert?”

As she rounded a corner and entered a new hallway, she couldn’t help but think how the bird took the words right out of her mouth. 

The new path was long and had pitfalls every so often. These odd robots flew after here, firing lasers at her. She dodged and weaved and quickly made her way down the corridor.

“You’re almost there!” Amy announced. “You’re doing great, Celeste!”

“Thanks!” She grinned as she continued down.

But then, something unthinkable happened. 

One of the robots appeared behind her and fired a laser blast that struck her back, knocking her to the floor.

She groaned and tried to reach for her wispon only for the robot to fire at it and knock it so far away that she couldn’t possibly reach it.

She turned around and leaned against the guard rail so that she could see her attackers. There stood four sleek and silver Egg Pawns that stared her down, prepared to end her. 

Celeste should’ve known that she was going to die in a place with the word death in the title. Still? Being surrounded by a bunch of robots was not the way she had planned to go. 

But with the robots having their blasters trained on her, she prayed that this would be quick. 

**~Sonic Forces~**

The prisoners of the Eggman Empire spent day in and day out sitting in their cells and doing a lot of nothing. They’d usually sit and talk between the walls for the most part except for when Emperor or his generals stopped for a visit.

The prison was a long towering cylinder that had rows upon rows of cells going up and up and up farther than the eyes could see, each with a bright blue force field to keep anyone from escaping.

Near, the top of the prison, where the lucky few could see the Mobius and the half moon above, a human named Joseph leaned against the metal and looked to the planet that he had called home. Being a prisoner of the Eggman Empire had been the worst experience of his life. But he was proud to have fought for both GUN and later the resistance before ending up in here. 

He looked back home and wondered how things were going. The very little information they had at least told them that the resistance was still around at the very least. But the question was how well they were doing. No one knew for sure and it was awful.

He sighed. He’d spent enough time thinking about it and just needed some rest. Nothing better to do than to think, talk and sleep around here anyway. So he lie on the metal bench and closed his eyes.

_ TWISH _

The sound of an electronic door opening caused his eyes to snap open and look outside his cell.

Passing into his field of vision was Zavok. Judging by how fast he was going, he was on a mission.

But of course, he didn’t let his presence go unknown. 

“Big Z!” He shouted out.

The Zeti stopped and glared at him for a moment. Piercing yellow eyes met calm blue ones. The human simply shrugged at him as more prisoners began to echo him. “Big Z! Big Z! Big Z!”

They would shout. 

Zavok scowled at him and gave an  _ I’m watching you _ gesture with his fingers before he continued along with his hurried pace. 

He arrived at the prison cell he was looking for. 

There sat a blue hedgehog, cuffed at the hands and feet despite being behind the forcefield of the cell. Of course, it was Sonic. 

And with everything ready to fall down out here on the Death Egg, Zavok knew he was needed to do what the others were too foolish to do. He had to before it was too late.

So, with a click of a button on the control panel, the field on the cell dropped and in stepped the Zeti.

“This is the end, Sonic.”

Sonic looked up from the floor and raised an eyeridge at the Zeti. “So you and your pals are finally gonna finish what you started?”

“I alone will be the one to do what the others are too weak to accomplish. They are blinded by their fixation on you, but I know the truth.”

With a click of a button, the glowing cuffs on Sonic’s wrists and ankles vanished. 

Sonic widened his eyes in shock, but still took the opportunity to stretch his arms and legs. “Got a pretty funny way of doing it. Don’t you just wanna beat me up like you did back in Sunset?”

“While beating you merciless would be amusing, I would take much more satisfaction in defeating you personally in front of your fellow inmates.”

With a dash, he whisked past Zavok. “The only beating coming from anyone here is the one I’m about to deliver to you. I’ve got six months of payback that I’m just dying to pay off.”

Like a rampaging bull, the Zeti tried to charge Sonic only for the hedgehog to dodge to the side. 

“Too slow, buddy!”

He then went chasing after him.

They landed on a platform in the center of the prison. All eyes were on them as they were shocked to see Sonic out of his cell.

“Looks like you’ve got the audience you asked for. Too bad this won’t end how you think it will.”

“We will see about that. Death Queen to me!”  **[1]**

With that, the Zeti jumped high into the sky and seemingly vanished. 

Sonic looked confusedly for a moment, only for a massive sound to bombard the room. It was extremely loud, like the sound of a gigantic fan thrumming against his ears.

But he was quick to find out when a massive Buzzer Bomber three times Zavok’s size came fluttering down to him. Atop it was the Zeti in question, which slammed his fists together and let out a mighty, monster roar that scared some of the prisoners.

But not Sonic. He stared down the Zeti. The one that had told him of his victories across the globe, the lives he’d taken and the fact that thanks to his failure he wasn’t able to save them. But Sonic wasn’t going to fail today. He was going to fight Zavok and he was going to win. 

“I can’t wait to see how long you last against this.” Zavok snarled.

“All that talk of taking me down up close and personal and you choose a mech? Heh, what a hypocrite.”

“Impudent runt! I’m going to savor watching you suffer!”

With that, the Zeti summoned a hoard of smaller Buzzer Bombers that swarmed the blue blur.

He took them head on, homing into each and every one of them and making it quick. It was just like old times, weaving in between blasts and turning badniks to scrap. It was fun. 

When he was done, he landed back on the platform to which the Zeti growled and fired a fiery red laser at him. But it was nothing for the fastest thing alive. He zipped around the platform, not letting it touch him at all until Zavok finally got fed up with firing lasers and went for a new approach.

He ushered the Death Queen to rise high above the arena.

He looked up too only to see them come down hard, with their stinger aimed right at him.

Sonic was quick to dive as the massive Badnik came down onto the platform.

When he got up he saw Zavok grunting as he tried to will the Buzzer Bomber off the platform but it was stuck. 

He took that as his chance and jumped up into the air, homing into the Zeti.

Once, twice and again! 

The prisoners cheered each time he hit, while Zavok only got angrier and angrier.

Finally, the Death Queen was free and flew back up into the air. 

He growled. “You’re not making this easy, are you?”

Sonic just shook his head. “After all this time, I’m surprised you’d think less of me!”

“No matter, crushing you will be all the more satisfying.”

“KICK HIS BUTT SONIC!” Joseph shouted to which the other prisoners agreed, shouting their own encouragements to the hedgehog.

“SILENCE ALL OF YOU!” Zavok shouted. “You’ll see what happens to pests like you when I’m through with him!”

“We’ll see about that!” Sonic announced.

With that, more of the Buzzer Bombers were summoned to try and to get at him again, but he was ready. He homed into each and every one of them without a problem.

When he landed back on the ground he smirked only to go wide eyed to see Zavok on the massive bee on the edge of the platform. Like a rampaging bull, the Death Queen came charging towards the hedgehog, stinger first.

For a brief moment, he was like a deer in the headlights, but was brought back to reality by the shouting of the prisoners. He dove out of the way, just narrowly avoiding being pierced by the great stinger.

Sonic then looked to Zavok as he came charging again, and dove away again. 

But the third time he came on, he tried something crazy. He decided to home in on him again. Once, twice, three times all over again.

The Bee was still moving while he did so making it harder for Zavok to keep balance and with the Hedgehog homing in on him, he fell off.

The Death Queen was left to crash into the wall and shatter into a million pieces.

The prisoner’s hooted and hollered at that to which the Zeti steamed. He then glared at Sonic and roared once again, before charging at him once again.

“Torro! Torro!” Sonic beamed at the Zeti.

Zavok was upon him, only for Sonic to jump over him, going as far as to use his head as a spring board and land on the other side of the arena. “Ole!”

There was a lot more cheering at that move.

Zavok veered around at that, facing the hedgehog and charging him again.

They did the same dance a few more times, with Sonic dodging the Zeti’s charges and the prisoners cheering every time he did so.

Soon, Zavok began to tire and got slower with more charges. And Sonic could spot slow from a mile away.

He stopped to catch his breath for a moment. Putting his hands on his knees and panting. And that was all Sonic needed.

He zipped up to him and jumped up into the air, homing in on him and sending him reeling backwards.

When he landed, Zavok attempted a swipe at him, but he missed. Sonic was far too fast for him when jumped up into the air and sent a homing attack into him again.

As soon as he touched down, Sonic took out all his pent up anger over the situation and wailed on him. Right hook, left hook, right hook again. Over and over and even with a few roundhouses added into the mix. The prisoners went nuts at that, wishing they too could do the same to Zavok or really any of the other generals of the empire.

Zavok clutched his chest in pain. With a pant he glowered at the hedgehog. “No! How could I lose to the likes of you again!?”

Sonic responded by putting the power of the boost to his right leg and delivering a powerful roundhouse to the Zeti’s chest that sent him flying into the force fields of one of the cells.

The prisoners inside cried out in fear as Zavok slammed into the forcefield. As soon as he struck it he was electrified by it. He screamed as he writhed against the field before he finally peeled off of it, falling in the deep chasm of the death prison below.

“Because you forgot who you were dealing with.” He grinned, putting his hands on his hips.

Everyone cheered at that, applauding Sonic at his victory.

“Woo-hoo!”

“You did it!” 

“Nice one Sonic!”

Sonic took a bow for them and then looked to the cellmates that were still covering their heads from having the 300 pound Zeti slam against their cell just a few moments ago. “Hey, are you guys okay?”

A green monkey with wave designs all over his fur looked up at him and put a hand to his heaving chest. “Chaos, Sonic! Wasn’t that a little overkill?”

“Hehe, sorry about that. The important thing is, I’m sure that we won’t be hearing from him anytime soon.”

They all agreed on that at least.

“Now, that that’s done, it’s time to set you all free!” 

They cheered again and with that, he jumped off of the platform and made his way to one of the cells.

Just as he was about to open it, the alarm started blaring and the door that Zavok entered the prison from slid open.

Joseph immediately turned to his side and his eyes widened in surprise at who he saw.

“You’re not going anywhere!”

Sonic turned to the direction of the voice to see none other than Shadow the Hedgehog.

Sonic laughed. “Well if it isn’t Mr. tall, dark and gruesome? Eggman send you in to finish me off too?”

“I’m here to put an end to this nonsense. You’re not going anywhere, Sonic. So just get back into your cell and nobody gets hurt.”

“And that would only make your life easier. I’m freeing every single one of my friends here and you’re not gonna stop me.”

Shadow glared at him, to which Sonic stood his ground, responding with a smirk. Everyone watched with baited breath waiting to see what would happen between the two hedgehogs.

In one fluid motion, Shadow pulled out a Chaos Emerald, shocking Sonic and the rest of the people there. “Chaos Control!”

In a flash he disappeared and reappeared in front of Sonic to which he promptly delivered a roundhouse to his lookalike.

“Sonic!” A few cried out.

Sonic groaned and looked up at hm. Shadow just huffed and declared, “That’s a final warning, Sonic. Get back into your cell.”

Quick to his feet, he launched himself at Shadow, delivering a punch to his face that he was quick to block. He then launched another kick at him that knocked Shadow away. He skidded to a halt and glared at him again.

Sonic dashed at him again, but he disappeared in a flash of light again. This time appearing at his side, to which the hedgehog quickly backpedaled, narrowly avoiding a punch from Shadow. He jumped up into the air and homed into the black hedgehog.

Shadow stumbled and fell but was quick to teleport again. This time, he was on the arena and took to firing off Chaos Spears at the hedgehog. 

“Woah!” Sonic shouted. He ran alongside the cells, dashing ahead, jumping over and sliding under blasts from Shadow.

The prisoners looked on with shock at the display, covering their heads as the blast struck their cell’s force fields only to harmlessly dissolve against them. Nowhere near as bad as when Zavok was catapulted against the field, but still terrifying all the same. 

Sonic took his chance and jumped up into the air, ready to home in on Shadow only to take a Chaos Spear to the gut. He fell to the ground in a heap at that.

“Had enough, Sonic?”

Sonic staggered to his feet and looked him dead in the eyes. “Is that all you got?”

Shadow just shook his head. “Look, I don’t wanna have to bring any further harm to you. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get back in your cell  _ now _ .”

“And I’ll fight you until every last one of them is free.”

Joseph looked at the fight. Sonic was finally free and he saw him take on Zavok and he wasn’t holding up too well against Shadow. If he continued like this then... it wouldn’t be good.

So that’s why he shouted. “RUN SONIC!”

“What!?”

“You’re not going to win this fight!” He insisted. “Leave the prison, join the resistance!”

“Don’t be absurd!” Shadow shouted.

“I’m not leaving any of you behind!” Sonic added.

“Then come back for us! Live to fight another day!” He insisted. “Come on, everyone look at him!”

The prisoners did look and saw the same. A hedgehog while still strong, would not be able to manage a second fight against a primed and ready Ultimate Life Form.

“Run Sonic!”

“Get out of here!”

“Leave!”

“Come back for us!”

“Please stay safe!”

Sonic looked between Shadow and the prisoners. His mind was racing a billion different ways about what he could possibly do. There was so much that could be done, he had to free them. But they were right, after the fight with Zavok, there was no way he could take Shadow right here and right now.

So with one last longing look at them, he announced. “I promise I’ll come back for you!”

And with that, he dashed off. He raced out of the door and a surprised Shadow was quick to follow.

“Good luck, Sonic.” 

**~Sonic Forces~**

The Chaotix continued to prove more and more of pain than the masked one had thought. But at this rate, they just kept coming and coming at him even more determined than ever before.

Espio would charge at him and he’d teleport just a few feet away only for him to have to vault himself over Charmy’s stinger and fire a laser at Vector to keep the Crocodile from landing a punch in the gut.

It was almost as if they were everywhere and were coming at him from all directions.

The masked one flew up into the air so that they were out of reach. Espio and Vector called out after him and fired their own attacks up into the sky where he just continued to dodge them. It was time to even the playing field again.

The sound of distortion rang out around them and with that, two clones of the being appeared before them.

“Are you kidding me?!” All three of them asked.

The masked clones simply chuckled before racing towards the Chaotix to engage all three of them.

The first clone took off for Charmy who decided not to take it on one on one and instead took off to the skies where the clone quickly chased after him.

As for the other clone, Vector didn’t back down at all. In fact, he ran out at it, rearing his fist back and prepared to deliver a punch to the being. But it teleported behind him and tried to fire a laser at his back. But Vector was quick to spin around and have his tail sweep the masked one’s feet right out from under him.

“You tried that trick before but it’s not gonna work this time.”

The clone grunted in response. 

With a yell, he fired off a music note that the clone threw up an electrical field around himself to block the shot and smack into the crocodile’s face.

He stumbled backwards and the clone took the chance to tackle him.

He pushed him back a few steps only for Vector to find his footing and leave marks in the snow as the two grappled each other looking one another eye to eye -literally in the case of the masked one.

And as for Espio, he met the original head on as well and they began to trade blows.

Punches, kicks and the like were expertly matched and neither were letting up. It was awfully intense.

With flight, tackling and straight out brawls going all out, the heat was on between the four… or well, six of them.

And then it happened…

**_WHEN EVERYTHING YOU KNOW HAS COME AND GOOOOOOOOOOOOONE_ **

**_(You are at your lowest, I am rising higher.)_ **

**_AND ONLY SCARS REMAIN OF WHO I WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS_ **

**_(We’ll fight in the ashes, you’re losing the fire!)_ **

**_WHEN-_ **

He groaned and froze the battlefield again.

“What do you want?!”

“You need to come up here right away.”

“ _ After _ I am finished.”

“No, you take orders from me and this requires all of your attention!”

“What could have possibly happened that requires my presence on the Death Egg now?”

“Sonic has escaped.”

The masked one paused and looked up to the sky and then looked back to the Chaotix.

“I’m on my way.”

With that, he unfroze them and kicked Espio in the face, knocking him away and sending him into yet another pile of snow.

Without a word, the clones disappeared and Infinite shot up into the sky leaving them behind.

With nothing to hold onto anymore, Vector too fell into the snow.

They all looked around confusedly only to help Espio out.

“Are you ok?” Charmy asked him.

“I’m fine.” He then looked around. “Where is the masked one?”

Vector just shook his head and pointed up at the sky.

Espio could only glare at the figure getting smaller and smaller as it flew up into the air.

**~Sonic Forces~**

Alarms blared the moment Sonic stepped foot outside of the prison. He went down a long hall, jumping over random pits and death traps as well as getting out of reach so that the ceiling that kept trying to come down on him wouldn’t crush him. It was kinda ridiculous how heavily the defenses were but he continued to run and run.

Leaving everyone behind was bad enough. But he was not going to let them down by getting caught or worse.

Speaking of getting caught, Shadow was right on his coattails, shouting out orders for him to get back into his cell that he only half listened to at this point. It was the same spiel he gave when they were actually in the prison so why bother listening to it now?

He catapulted off of a spring and was outside.

For the very first ime in six months, Sonic was free of containment. He was met with immediate cold and darkness. Well it would’ve been pitch black if it weren’t for the great planet he could see at his side, with the sun’s glow just barely peeking over the side. But if that weren’t enough of a light show then the glow coming from the massive buildings atop asteroids definitely did it. Along with all of that massive warships were peppered the sky around him, flying in tight formations.

Sonic knew he was off planet, since he could actually catch little glimpses of Mobius from his cell. Heck, he even thought Eggman made sure of that to mess with him. But still, to be out here was truly a sight he’d never get tired of.

But it was back to reality when he landed on a grind rail that took him down to another building atop another asteroid.

“CHAOS SPEAR!”

Sonic knew what that meant and instantly jumped off of the grind rail without much thought. Luckily for him, a few Buzzer Bombers were present for him to home into. Soon, he found himself going into an asteroid that broke apart to reveal a spring that catapulted him up onto a solid metal platform. 

When he landed he stopped to see where Shadow was only to find him on a smaller much lower platform. “Ha! Not gonna catch me now.”

“Tch! Idiot.” Shadow snarked, before holding up his Chaos Emerald.

Sonic swore and was already beginning to boost away before he even uttered the words and disappeared in a flash of light.

Shadow did not appear on the platform though and Sonic decided to jump to the entrance of the next building rather than taking the rail that conveniently waited for him.

That’s where Shadow was waiting for him, but he didn’t expect was for Sonic to boost past him without a problem at all.

Shadow growled but continued to chase after him, following him when he was off of springs that lead him to the exit, which lead to another set of springs.

Sonic had already crashed through asteroids and landed on a set of grind rails with a group of chasers. He was far too occupied dodging their shots. He probably thought that he was far ahead of Shadow. But he would show him.

Not even finishing bouncing off of the springs, he called upon the power of the Chaos Emerald and appeared next to him in a flash, shocking the blue blur and nearly causing him to fall of the rail.

“CHAOS SPEAR!” He shouted again.

Bright arrows of light appeared around him and fired at the hedgehog. But each every one of them missed him.

The fact that not a single one of them landed on him when he was only on a grind rail was shocking. There was very little room to dodge. But still, he continued on.

The rail lead them into another building and this one was different than the last.

They entered from the bottom and this one simply had a spiral stairway up to the top where it lead out into more space.

Sonic didn’t waste time boosting up the stairs to which Shadow did the same, just a little ways behind him.

When they finally reached out in space and on the rails again, that’s when Sonic finally saw it. The gigantic ball of metal that depicted his oldest enemy’s face. It was the Death Egg again.

“The Death Egg! Are you kidding me?!” Sonic shouted.

Shadow couldn’t help but look confusedly at him. “Got a problem, Sonic?”

“You wouldn’t know.” Sonic shrugged. “Eggman’s built this thing more times than I can count but I thought he got over it years ago.”

Shadow huffed and began to shout, “Chaos-”

“Now you just wait a minute!” Sonic snapped. “What the heck are you doing here, fighting on Eggman’s side? Do you have amnesia again or something?”

Shadow rolled his eyes. “Oh please, I’m perfectly fine.”

“Then what is your deal?”

Shadow just couldn’t help but give him a smirk. “Don’t ask questions you couldn’t begin to understand the answers to, Sonic. CHAOS SPEAR!”

Sonic gasped as more of the light arrows came for him and at that, Sonic jumped right off of the rail. Shadow gaped at him as he saw him go plummeting down only to see him to land on a ship. It was one of the smaller fighters. But it was fast and Sonic was able to hold on.

“Smell ‘ya later, Shadow!” Sonic gave him a two finger salute as it rocketed off.

Shadow grit his teeth in frustration. “You’re not getting away that easily! Chaos Spear!”

Shadow fired off several Chaos Spears at the blue one and his ship. But seemed like for once, the doctor coded something well as it weaved in between every one of his shots.

With a groan he watched Sonic fly away as the rail lead into another portion of the Death Egg. Nothing he could do now.

Sonic had escaped him.

Sonic was glad that he finally lost Shadow and the small fleet of ships he was on flew closer and closer to the Death Egg. He was gonna be fine. All he needed to do was to find a ship and get home.

But first, he needed to live as the Death Egg finally took notice of him and began to fire on its own ships.

He jumped between the different ones as they continued to be picked off one by one. But with enough concentrated fire, he was finally knocked out of the sky and fell deep in a hole in the Death Egg.

Knowing he would hit solid ground, he got into position and dived down to see where it would take him.

**~Sonic Forces~**

Celeste should’ve known that she was going to die in a place with the word death in the title. Still? Being surrounded by a bunch of robots was not the way she had planned to go.

But with the robots having their blasters trained on her, she prayed that this would be quick.

Her eyes screwed shut as the robots advanced on her. It was over, this was it.

And then she heard the sound of metal falling apart.

_ What the heck? _

She looked to see a streak of blue ramming into the robots all around her and turning them to scrap metal. Needless to say, it was quick. 

Now that was something she had seen so often on television throughout her life, but seeing it before her very eyes was truly something. Still, the fact that she was seeing it was insane.

She figured she was already dead and she was having some hallucination, that this couldn’t possibly be what she was seeing considering the only person in the world this could be was dead.

But they uncurled from their ball form and landed in front of her in a crouch.

And there he was. Quills as dark as blue as Mobius’ oceans, shoes as red as the bricks back home and when he rose to his feet and opened his eyes, they were as green as the luminous chaos emerald.

He reached out a hand to her and smiled. “Is everything okay?”

The voice… it really was him.

Sonic the Hedgehog.

But he had been dead for months. Which meant if she was seeing him, it was an angel. Needless to say as she took his hand and rose to her feet, that lead her to the dumbest question she had ever asked in her entire life. “Am I dead?”

Sonic raised an eyeridge at her and laughed. “I hope not. After all the craziness I’ve just been through, meeting a dead girl would be pretty wild. Though not the weirdest thing to ever happen to me.”

“I- I- I don’t understand?”

“You’d have to have been there.” Sonic shrugged.

But Celeste shook her head. “No, I mean… I don’t understand. If I’m not dead and you’re here that would mean that you’re alive.”

“Well, yeah.” Sonic said. “I was alive last I checked. Why is this such a big deal?”

“You’re dead!” Celeste shouted at him.

Sonic’s heart sank at that. “I’m what?!”

“You died six months ago!” Celeste continued. “After you weren’t able to beat Eggman, he aired the whole thing on TV and showed us what happened. He told the whole world that you died that day.”

Sonic frowned and was about to respond only for her com to flicker to life.

“Celeste, is everything okay?” Amy’s voice came. “Everybody’s waiting for you back at the hangar. We’re getting out of here.”

Calm and relief washed over Sonic’s face at the sound of her voice. Celeste figured that was why he decided to focus on that instead of Celeste’s statement. In fact, that’s why before Celeste could answer, he did. “Out of here? That’s a relief. Where’s the first way out, Amy?”

And then they were only met with silence.

Sonic looked confusedly at the girl who he now knew was Celeste. And she just gave him the same confused look.

“SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Celeste nearly busted an eardrum at that, it was so loud.

They could hear sobbing on the other end of the line after that. Once again, Amy had lost her cool in the middle of a mission. Only this time, no one could really blame her for it. She was now a blubbering mess from the other end and it left Celeste confused.

But Sonic didn’t seem phased at all by this. “Hey, Amy. Good to hear your voice after all this time.”

A million words a minute came out at that. All in some sort of sobbing gibberish mess that Celeste didn’t quite understand.

But Sonic responded right away. “I’m fine. Right now, we to move. You said there was a hangar somewhere nearby, could you tell us where it is so that Celeste?”

She nodded.

“And I can get out of here.”

Amy cleared her throat. “Ju-just down the hall. It’s long but you’ll get into the hangar.”

“No problem.” Sonic smiled.

He then turned to Celeste and scooped her up in his arms. She let out a yelp at that.

“Hold tight, Celeste. We’re out of here.”

She didn’t know what exactly she expected but in a second she was standing before everyone in Sonic’s arms.

All of them gave flabbergasted looks at them and she honestly couldn’t tell who was the most shocked of the group.

Sonic on the other hand just smiled and waved at them, “Hey everyone. Guess who’s back?”

Because she still felt all eyes on her she gave a sheepish smile and added, “Mission accomplished?”

Knuckles was the first to drop the dumbfounded look and smile. “You son of a gun! Old Eggman told us you kicked the bucket.”

Sonic was nonchalant about it, unlike when she told him. “Psh… please. You really think that he could lay a finger on me?”

“Well… this definitely wasn’t in any of the data I got about this place.” Rouge said. “But I’m happy to see you Sonic.”

Silver just shook his head and grinned. “We may have failed the mission, but with you here… just… I’m so happy to see you Sonic.”

Rhythm was the one to speak up. “And looks like we owe all of that to Celeste.

“She found Sonic!” Gadget cheered.

“Well… I didn’t…”

But Sonic shook his head. “Don’t be so modest. Without you, I’d have probably ran in the opposite direction and then I’d have never gotten out of here. Thank you, Celeste.”

“Yeah… the reunion is great.” Fierro cut in. “But may I remind you that we’re still on the Death Egg. We need to get out of here now.”

And with that, the sound of distortion rang out around them, making everyone’s blood run cold.

“Oh but you are not going anywhere…”

They turned and came face to face with the masked one. Floating in the Death Egg before all of them.

“I see that you all have managed to rendezvous with your fallen comrade. Such a happy reunion, I am sure. But this is as far as you go.”

Without a word, the sound rang out again and the ship that they were all about to board disappeared.

“Leave us alone, you masked clown!” Sonic shouted. “You’re not laying a hand on any of them.”

He was crouched and ready, prepared to home in on him at a moment’s notice. None of them wanted him to have to go through with that. Not after what they saw happen all those months ago.

“Masked clown, really?” He shook his head. “No. I will not go by such juvenile names. You may call me Infinite. At least in the brief moments that remain to you. Now prepare to oblivion.

He began to fly towards them, ready to destroy them all.

And at that very moment, a space ship flew into the base and slamed into Infinite knocking him into a wall.

The ship opened up and revealed Espio and Vector.

Vector covered his mouth, looking a little greener than usual. “That’s the last time we ever let Charmy drive.”

“Agreed.” Espio added. He then waved everyone forward. “Get in quickly!”

Without much argument everyone got into the shuttle and after a quick switch of drivers, they were off leaving the Death Egg as quickly as possible.

**~Sonic Forces~**

Sonic let out a sigh as they approached land. “Now that was close…”

“Too close if you ask me.” Gadget added.

They all agreed. Happy to have gotten away from what could’ve been the end.

“So it’s back to Sunset then, right?” Sonic asked.

Knuckles shook his head. “That base was destroyed we’re headed somewhere… a little closer to my heart.”

“Oh and where’s that?”

Knuckles smiled and said, “Take a look for yourself.”

Sonic took a look out the window and his eyes widened in surprise as the clouds cleared.

Floating proud above the ocean was none other than Angel Island, but it wasn’t quite the same. Large ancient temple like structures stood all around them and several Echidna mingled about. It was Pachacamac’s village?!

“We’ve got a lot to tell you, Sonic.”

**EPISODE KNUCKLES UNLOCKED!**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] The robot that Zavok uses is apparetly called the Death Queen, at least according to the Sonic Forces OST.
> 
> Staying up to almost 3AM to finish a chapter of your fanfic? Well… that’s one way to spend your Valentine’s Day. Other weird things while writing this chapter include writing Zavok’s bossfight to Metal Sonic’s boss music (my music is on shuffle and it popped up) and also writing a lot of this chapter to Mario Odyssey music. You know how weird it is to write Sonic and Shadow duking it out to “Jump Up! Super Star?” Ahahahaha. No, but for real. We are done here and this is officially the longest chapter of the story so far. Even longer if you count part 1. I hope you liked it because wew! That was a blast to write. Next chapter is going to be EPISODE & KNUCKLES which I’m excited to write. So until next time, my wonderful readers.


	7. Announcement

Yo, I get next to no following for this on AO3. If you wanna continue this, please follow the story "Trials of War: A Sonic Forces Rewrite" on Fanfiction.net.   
Thank you.

Maybe someday I'll upload the rest here if I get the demand, but eh. For now, I can't be bothered.

**Author's Note:**

> [1] Humans are included in this story just as much as the animal characters are. I imagine them in the Unleashed style and you’ll be seeing a lot of them as both civilians as well as a few in the resistance.  
> [2] Yes, I know originally Sonic blocks Zavok’s punch. But honestly? Are we really supposed to believe that Sonic is able to block a punch from Zavok the frikin’ tank with his noodle arms? Zavok’s fist alone is about the size of Sonic’s head so… yeah.
> 
> So... that's it for the prologue. Lemme know what you guys think. And just to note. How do you guys want the OC to be written in this story? Do you want it to be an actual character I create or do you want me to keep it vague so that you can put yourself in the characters shoes like I did in the true fate trilogy.  
> Lemme know in the comments and be sure to check out the next chapter.


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